Revenge of the Clown
by Ai Tennshi
Summary: One night, all is normal except for the fact that Luffy is not raiding the fridge. Then the crew find that Luffy's hat appears to have vanished... Complete
1. The Lost Hat

A/N This is just a random idea that came to me… I couldn't think of what to write, and then suddenly this came to me, and it seemed perfect. I don't know exactly how long this is going to turn out—all I know is what's going to happen. I don't know about how anything will connect, or how to end it. But I don't think that it should be any longer than five chapters… Enjoy!

Disclaimer: I own none of the characters, or the world—those belong to Oda Eiichirou.

Revenge of the Clown

Chapter 1:The Lost Hat

It was a night just like any other on the Going Merry. Not quiet, by any means—the swordsman was training and the cook was challenging the marksman and doctor, who had been attempting to steal food during the night—but quieter than the daytime.

"Come on, Sanji, just a bit!"

"I said, get _out_ of my kitchen! You had a snack after supper, you'll survive until breakfast!"

This was followed by a whine from the doctor, which was immediately followed by a crash. A second later the marksman and doctor came bolting out the door.

As he listened to this, the swordsman could not help but feel that something was off. There was nothing unusual about refrigerator raiding in the middle of the night, or the cook grappling with those who did so. What was off was the quick retreat of the raiding party. As he watched Usopp and Chopper bolt across the deck, it suddenly struck him, and his arms stopped in the middle of swinging his weight.

The captain had not raided the refrigerator that night. Putting down his weight, he heard calm footsteps leaving the kitchen.

"Luffy didn't come."

In Zoro's comment to Sanji, there was no question, but a reply came anyway.

"No, he didn't."

"That's strange." Sanji snorted.

"He probably came up earlier, before the rest of us got up." Zoro glared.

"Are you saying that I wouldn't hear him getting up? I have sharp ears."

"Not when you're sleeping like the idiot you are for longer than all the rest of us put together."

"Are you asking for a fight!" Zoro's hands had flown to his swords, and Sanji's leg lifted from the ground.

"He hasn't been up here."

This voice came from above, and Zoro and Sanji's heads shot up to look at the black haired woman who had called down calmly from the observation deck.

"I wonder if something is wrong," the woman continued. "The captain never misses a night to raid the fridge." Zoro looked up at her suspiciously.

"You're supposed to be watching the ocean, not the deck. How would you know?"

"Insult Robin-chan again and you're dead, aegagropila!"

"As if you could do me any harm, fancy-brow!"

"You-"

"Captain-san is awake," Robin cut in, her voice still as calm as anything. The swordsman and cook instantly looked up at her. "He appears to be searching for something. He is saying something, but I only sent my eyes there, so I could not hear anything."

"I'd better go see what he's up to." Zoro turned and walked off towards the males' cabin. As he walked, he heard Sanji's voice behind him.

"Ah, my Robin-chan, you must be so cold up there! Would you like something warm?"

"Coffee would be nice, cook-san."

Zoro snorted as he opened the door on the deck. That was the third time that he had heard that same exchange in the last twenty-four hours—though there were minor variations on the cook's part.

As he climbed down into the cabin, he indeed found his captain searching frantically. He knew instantly what the object of his search was. For one thing, the straw hat was missing from Luffy's head. For another, he was tirelessly repeating the words "my hat, my hat" as he looked in every crack of the room. He did not appear to notice that Zoro had come into the room.

"Luffy, how did you lose your hat?"

Luffy replied without a single pause of his hands as he continued to tear the room apart.

"My hat, I can't find my hat!" Though used to his captain's ways, there was a tone of impatience to Zoro's voice as he replied.

"Yes, I can see that. How did you lose it?"

As he answered, Luffy's voice sounded completely calm. However, the rapid movements that he made as he searched gave away his panic.

"I don't know! I was asleep, and then I woke up and felt hungry and decided to go up and get something, but I couldn't find my hat!" Zoro stared.

"You mean your hat disappeared in your sleep?" Luffy turned to stare back.

"No, it was gone I woke up."

"That's the same thing, you idiot!"

"Oh, it is? …My hat!" And Luffy was back to his searching. Taking a quick look around the room, Zoro found himself mystified. Luffy could not have simply lost his hat like this. That simply did not happen. When Luffy lost his hat, it was always during a battle-

"Luffy! Were you dreaming about a battle?" On sudden inspiration, Zoro wondered if Luffy had subconsciously stormed around in his sleep, losing his hat as he did so.

"No, I dreamed about eating meat." Zoro sighed. That was typical, but not the kind of dream that would lose a person's hat.

Zoro joined Luffy in hunting for the hat, attempting to keep Luffy from destroying the room too badly as they searched. Just when they had covered half of the room very thoroughly, there was a crash from above, and Usopp and Chopper came falling in.

"Sanji isn't here, is he?" Chopper asked, looking nervously around. But Usopp's first concern was the boat.

"Why are you destroying the ship? We're in the middle of the ocean, idiots! And Merry is precious! You can't just-"

"Luffy lost his hat," Zoro cut in, keeping an eye on Luffy in case he decided to start searching in a way that was harmful to the boat again. Instantly, worries of Sanji seemed to disappear from the reindeer, and the long-nosed boy abruptly stopped his talking about the importance of the ship.

"He what?" asked the marksman and doctor in one voice.

"Lost his hat. In his sleep. We're searching. We've finished this half, so you two look in that quarter, and we'll try this one."

Ten minutes and an incredibly thorough search later, they had to admit that the hat was nowhere in the cabin. As Usopp and Chopper worried, Luffy went on a fifth search of the room, and Zoro wondered where Luffy could have lost it if he had not gone up onto the deck, the door on the wall swung open to reveal the fuming face of the navigator.

"What in the _world_ made you all decide to make a racket at this time of night in here! And _why _is it that I'm the only person asleep at this time of night?"

"Robin's on the observation deck, I think Sanji must be pampering her since he hasn't come after us, and we-"

"I can't find my hat," Luffy cut into Usopp's explanation, still searching.

"And we were looking for it, but it isn't in here," Chopper explained helpfully. The red-haired navigator stared at the four men.

"Are you sure that you looked thoroughly?"

"Of course we have! The four of us checked the entire room four times. Luffy claims to have lost it in his sleep, but it isn't in this room." As Zoro spoke, a sudden thought occurred to Usopp.

"Hey Nami, he hasn't been into your and Robin's room, has he?" Nami shot a dark glare in the direction of the marksman, who instantly regretted his question. They all knew that it was a ridiculous question to ask in the first place. The only times when the men entered the women's room was when there was a problem, and the door connecting the two cabins under the deck was always locked from the side of the women's room.

"Since when have I allowed any of you in this room at random?" Then she turned to the calm but mystified Zoro, the nervous Chopper, and the searching Luffy, in whom there were the subtle signs of panic. "How about the deck? Maybe he sleepwalked…"

"Robin says that he never came up," Zoro replied, shaking his head. Nami's brow furrowed.

"Luffy, are you sure that you had it when you went to sleep?"

"I had it! That was rude!" Luffy's reply came in a huff, closely followed by backup from his crew.

"Nami," Usopp reasoned, "one of us was bound to notice if his hat was gone when we went to sleep."

"Luffy wouldn't lose his hat while conscious," Zoro added.

"He had it when we went to sleep, I saw it!" Chopper's words left no argument.

Nami looked back at her own room, scanning it thoroughly.

"It definitely isn't here…" she said slowly.

For a time, there was silence. Luffy completed his search, and then stood in the middle of the room trying to decide what to do. It wasn't in their cabin, nor was it in Nami and Robin's. That meant that it could only be somewhere in the rest of the ship… Without a moment's hesitation, Luffy jumped out onto the deck. This broke the silence under the deck as well.

"We should try and look up there, too," Usopp said as he stood and climbed back up, Zoro having wordlessly left after Luffy. Chopper followed, and Nami closed and locked the door before climbing up from her own room.

As the last three were climbing up onto the deck, Luffy bolted out from the storage room, apparently having searched both that and the bathroom beyond that, and Zoro exited from the anchor cable hangar, which was on the other side of the lower deck, shaking his head briefly to Luffy.

Luffy instantly was on the higher deck, having pulled himself swiftly up, running into the only un-searched room—the kitchen. The four others had scarcely begun to ascend the stairs as well, when,

"You are _not _getting food! I have to tell you night after night! Live with it until morning!"

Just as Sanji finished his last sentence, Nami entered the kitchen, closely followed by the others.

"No, Sanji-kun—Luffy lost his hat."

Sanji's mouth fell open, and he turned to look at Luffy, who indeed had, instead of heading for the fridge, begun to search.

"Haven't you checked the cabin, Nami-san? He had it when he went to sleep, and Robin-chan said that he hasn't been up on the deck."

"We've searched our cabin multiple times, Nami looked at the girls' cabin, Luffy checked the storage room and bathroom, and Zoro checked the anchor cable hangar, but we haven't found it. And it obviously isn't in the kitchen either," Usopp added as Luffy ran out of the room, having completed his search. The others followed after scanning the room themselves.

Failing to find his hat on the deck, Luffy reached up to grip the edge of the observation deck, pulling himself up.

"Captain-san? Is something wrong?" Robin asked in her usual calm and collected manner, wrapped up in a blanket and sipping her coffee.

"I can't find my hat- Hey, there's a ship!" He had spotted a ship on the horizon.

"Luffy, don't get distracted! It doesn't matter that there's a ship! Can you see your hat from up there?" Sanji called up at him in exasperation.

"Nope- Hey look-"

"Luffy, stop getting distracted!" This time it was Usopp, Sanji, and Nami who called up at their captain.

"No, the ship is Buggy's!"

"Buggy?" questioned Usopp, Sanji and Chopper. Robin raised an eyebrow in surprise. Zoro spun around to look in the direction where Luffy was looking. Nami looked up at Luffy.

"You know Buggy the Clown?" inquired Robin.

"He and Zoro fought him when they were trying to persuade me to join them," said Nami.

"And he tried to kill Luffy in Logue Town," added Zoro.

"Oh, that guy with the big red nose?" asked Sanji.

"Yeah, that one," Nami replied.

"That's strange…" Robin frowned, and said her words as though speaking to herself.

"What is?" asked Usopp.

"He was here about half an hour ago… Just a little before you all woke up." The rest of the crew stared at the archaeologist in shock. Even the rubber man turned to look at the woman sitting behind him.

"You're supposed to say that sort of thing!" shouted the captain, swordsman, and marksman. Meanwhile, the cook swooned.

"Robin-chan is so stunning, the way she's so indifferent to everything," Sanji commented, unheard by all.

"Who's Buggy?" Chopper asked Usopp.

"You mean he came on to this ship?" Nami asked, panicking.

"It's alright, Nami-san! You can hide in my arms! I'll protect you!" However, as Sanji approached the navigator, he was knocked out of the way by her impatient hand as Robin replied.

"No—he just brought his ship about five meters away from this boat. But he told me that he had no idea who the Straw Hat Pirates were, or who Straw Hat Luffy was either… I didn't think I'd mention it since he never came onto this ship or seemed to do anything harmful."

"Robin," Zoro spoke up. "Were both his hands in sight for the whole time that he was talking to you? And his head?" Robin looked at the swordsman, raising an eyebrow.

"Of course his head was there. And his hands were clasped behind his back."

"Robin, what he means is, could you actually _see_ his hands, or did you just see his arms and assume that his hands were attached to them?" Robin's eyebrow rose higher at this.

"No, I didn't see his hands in that case."

There was an instant uproar.

A/N That's all for this chapter. Review! I refuse to update unless I get at least two decent reviews! (Decent meaning actual constructive criticism—not flaming.) You can flame if you like, but I'm more likely to listen to constructive criticism.


	2. The Clown Pirates

For disclaimer, refer to chapter 1. And here are replies to reviews:

Denygo: Thanks, that's what I was aiming for—something that could really happen. Most of the One Piece stories are either romantic, or AU (including the stories about new crew members) or both, and I find that quite annoying. I know that a lot of people may not agree with me, but I believe that this group has a bond much stronger than a romantic or family-type one. Which is why I decided to try and write a One Piece story that seemed closer to the original. The only hard part is keeping everyone in character…

babe300: Luffy and Sanji… Yeah, I almost forgot—Zoro's swords are useless against Buggy. But Robin could easily help too, don't you think? I'm not quite sure what's going to happen… It could be the crew that gets Buggy, or it could be some other random pirate that came along… Or (smirks) Buggy could get away with it…

Emma Iveli: Don't worry, everyone will get sufficient explanations! Thanks for the compliment!

Thank you very much for your reviews! Now, on with the story…

Revenge of the Clown

Chapter 2:The Clown Pirates

"Captain, why did you steal his hat?" asked the mystified Kabaji as their ship slowly distanced itself from that of the Straw Hat Pirates. "I thought that you were going to get your revenge on them."

The captain, who had previously been laughing wildly at his theft's success, swung around to glare, dropping the straw hat that he had been swinging around onto the deck as he did so. His already large, red nose seemed to become larger and redder with anger.

"You people were all knocked out when I was actually fighting him that first time. If you'd been awake, you would have heard that this hat is his most valued treasure."

"This thing, a treasure?" asked Mohji dubiously as he picked the hat up distastefully by the edge of the brim, dangling it in front of his face. "It doesn't look like much more than an old, dirty hat to me. I'd want to get rid of it as quickly as possible if I were him."

"I have to agree," cut in Alvida, lounging on a couch on deck as she always did, displaying her unrivaled beauty. "If he really finds the necessity to have a straw hat on his head, he might as well just get a newer, less battered one." Buggy shrugged.

"I would agree, but I also know why that hat is so important to him." His crew and Alvida looked at him with interest before he could continue.

"You mean that idiot pirate actually has a reason that he wears this filthy hat? Apparently he does have a little bit of brain. But what sort of reason could persuade anyone, even a stupid brainless pirate, to wear something like this?" Kabaji's voice gave away his distaste for the hat as he took it from Mohji, trying to touch it as little as possible, and turned it over and over. "Is there some sort of secret to this?"

"It's the hat that symbolizes his vow with Shanks." Everyone stared at the Clown Pirate.

"Shanks? You mean Red-Haired Shanks? But that's a big pirate! A really big one!" Buggy turned to glare at the crewmember that had spoken.

"Do you mean to say that we're below Shanks?" The crewmember cowered.

"No, but… It's just… They're probably next in line to One Piece after White Beard! If the Straw Hat Crew knows him-" Suddenly, the man was lifted off the ground, a hand around his neck. Buggy held out his arm before him, but it lacked a hand—the hand that was strangling the man who had just doubted him.

"I know that you're only a new crew member," growled Buggy, "So I'll let you off lightly." With this the hand released the man who collapsed with a gasp on the deck. "But I'll tell you this—we are no lower than Shanks. If they are that close to One Piece, then so are we. Shanks and I were comrades when we were student pirates. We are no lower than Shanks."

"You and Shanks?" asked Alvida in surprise. "You never told me that!"

"It isn't something I advertise. I'm ashamed of it. It's that man's fault that I never got off to the good start as I could have if he hadn't been there."

"It's Shanks' fault that he ate a devil's fruit," added Mohji.

"Mohji, you're supposed to support me! Stop spreading my problems around!"

"Whatever the case about Shanks, what is this vow that makes the hat so important to Luffy?" Alvida's question brought the conversation back on track.

"I don't really know—after that he attacked."

"Anyhow, what do you intend to do with that hat? You say that he'll definitely come after us, so what are you going to do with that?"

Buggy smirked.

"He's going to pursue us, naturally, and we'll dock on an island where I set a certain trap for that entire crew. Then we attack, and next thing you know, our bounty will be higher than a hundred million!" The crew exchanged glances.

"What sort of trap is this?" The question came from Alvida, her head lifted slightly from where she still reclined on her couch. Her tone was suspicious, but her eyes showed interest. As Buggy replied, he appeared to be slightly irritated at her apparent lack of faith in him.

"I have a cage hanging from the top of a tree, hidden by the leaves. The moment anyone steps under it, the mechanism will be triggered, and the cage will fall, trapping whoever stands below it. I tested it once—it works perfectly!"

"That it does," grumbled Mohji, looking across at the lion that lay fast asleep on the other side of the deck with the occasional snort or growl. "Poor Richie… Never gets any respect on this ship!"

"That man is strong," Alvida countered, ignoring Mohji's complaints along with everyone else. "What's going to stop him from simply toppling the cage?"

Buggy's smirk widened.

"The cage is made of _kairoseki_, naturally."

Alvida still did not appear convinced.

"That will only stop Luffy from touching it. What about the others?" Though Buggy looked at the beauty with irritation, he showed more patience than he would have ever shown any of his crew.

"Most of the crew, including Kabaji and Mohji, will be waiting to attack, since that idiot captain will run off ahead for his hat." Alvida smiled.

"Of course my man would have everything planned out perfectly. So what do you intend to lure him into the right spot with?"

"His hat, naturally! If we just toss it into place, the trap will be complete!" With this, Buggy turned to his crew. "Men, at this time tomorrow, we'll be one of the most wanted pirates in the world! It's time for a gaudy feast, fellows!"

With a loud cheer, wine began to be brought up from the ship's storage room. However, before any sort of feast could start, the man on the observation deck called down.

"Captain, if we go any further, it will be impossible for them to see us!"

Buggy reacted instantly, without a moment of hesitation.

"Lower the anchor, men!"

With a cheer only slightly less energetic than the last, the men proceeded to do as they were instructed.

"You did spend a great deal of time thinking this whole thing out, dear."

"Well, my lovely Alvida, every plan must be thought out thoroughly if it is to go well."

"It must be indeed, captain," agreed Kabaji from where he leaned against the edge of the ship.

"The anchor has been lowered, captain!" called the men who had gone to do the job.

"Good! Now we feast!" Another enthusiastic roar followed Buggy's words, and the continuation of the preparations began. However, no sooner than people had begun picking up the barrels and bottles than another call came down from the observation deck.

"Captain, the Straw Hat Pirates are beginning to move! They appear to be raising their anchor!"

Again, Buggy reacted instantly, a glint in his eyes.

"Men, raise the anchor!"

This time, while some attempted half-hearted cheers, some openly groaned at their lost feast. Buggy spun around to look at them with his sharpest glare, and when he spoke, his voice was as cold as ice.

"This is going to be the event that breaks us through to becoming one of the greatest pirates. The next man who groans will be thrown off of this ship."

There was an instant energetic roar.

"Good! Now, men, let our glory and revenge begin!"

With another roar, the crewmembers began rushing about, raising the anchor, checking the direction, and making sure that the boat was moving at its swiftest speed. Buggy, Alvida, Kabaji, Mohji and Richie, however, remained sitting as usual, preferring to let the ones of lower status do the work.

"Just be careful, dear," Alvida said lazily, reaching out for a wine bottle, easily removing the cork and taking a sip. "You know that those people have quite a bit of luck to make up for their lack of common sense."

"Oh, I remember, Alvida," Buggy replied, suppressing a shudder at the thought of his last encounter with Luffy's unbelievable and miraculous luck. Half a second before his sword could cut off that annoying, smiling head, a bolt of lightning had struck. Straw Hat, apparently, had been unaffected, but Buggy himself had found the experience quite painful. But not, he thought, worse than that first time—he remembered wandering around with nothing but his head, hands and feet, lacking his other body parts on account of that thief, that deceptive red-haired woman. About the only good outcome of that journey had been his meeting Alvida. "I am never going to fall victim to that idiot's luck again. Even their luck can't keep up forever."

"I thoroughly agree, captain, but I agree that we ought to be extra careful," Kabaji spoke up. "They do say, 'what happens twice happens thrice'."

Buggy glared at his first mate.

"You may recall the saying 'success comes on the third time' as well."

"That's true," yawned Kabaji. "I just told you to be careful."

"Captain!" came a frantic call from the front of the ship, along with five men coming running. Our Eternal Pose has broken!" For a moment, there was silence. Then Buggy's eyes bulged.

"The Eternal Pose did _what?_ What were you doing, playing?" The red-nosed man's hands once again left his wrists as they gathered up his daggers. With a squeal of fright, the five crewmembers huddled together.

"No, captain! The navigator suddenly felt ill, and in clasping his head, accidentally dropped the Eternal Pose!"

"Where is the navigator?" panicked the captain.

"He fainted, captain! Right before the Eternal Pose smashed!"

As the captain and the five crewmembers exchanged words of threat and panic, Kabaji looked at Mohji and Alvida.

"See? What happens twice happens thrice. He should have gotten three or four of those."

Alvida glared at the acrobat.

"The crew," spoke her icy tone, "should never insult the captain unless they have a death wish."

Meanwhile, Mohji looked behind them. They had stopped moving upon the breaking of the Eternal Pose, and in the time that they were squabbling, the Straw Hats' ship had already come into view behind their ship, even without the use of binoculars.

"Captain!" Mohji called. "The Straw Hats are rapidly gaining on us!"

Before Buggy could respond, Alvida spoke.

"We're strong enough to defeat them even without any elaborate plan. Dear, just follow the Logue Pose."

Looking behind the ship, Buggy confirmed Mohji's words. Left without a choice, he called to his crew.

"Men! Follow the Logue Pose! Quickly! The Straw Hats are gaining!"

The men instantly rushed to follow their captain's orders, although their movements betrayed their loss of confidence very clearly. Alvida could see this.

"Don't lose heart, boys! There are a great number of us, and all quite strong as well. There are only six of them—the five that we saw in Logue Town, and the black-haired woman who was sitting on the deck! And we know that two of those are cowards—they ran off at Logue Town, ignoring the prospect of their captain's death! We will have no more than four to fight seriously at the worst!"

Alvida's stern shout was returned with an energetic roar.

"It is unlike you to encourage them," commented Kabaji in an indifferent tone.

Alvida did not reply. Her eyes flickered around to look at the ship that pursued them, and then turned back to look in the direction they were heading.

A/N Not as long as my last chapter, and not even a single member of the Straw Hats in it, but this chapter was necessary, I felt. _Kairoseki_ is that rock that has the properties of the ocean, thereby making it impossible for those who have eaten a Devil Fruit to touch. I don't know what they call it in English…

And again, I'll only put up the next chapter when I get three more reviews, so REVIEW! I really want to know what you people think! Did you like it? Is there any thing particular that you think I should do to make this better? Tell me anything!


	3. Pursuit

Replies to reviews:

xXSanji-kunXx: (grins) I'm glad you like it. Here's the update!

nikki: Meaning that I could have ended the last chapter in a more interesting way? If that's what you mean, then I agree. I was a little pressed for time when I was writing that, which was why it was shorter than intended, and I also was frantically searching for a way to end it, so…

babe300: You're very welcome! But I'm not sure that it will be Luffy, Sanji and Robin who get them in the end. I have a plan forming, and though I'm still not sure, I'm thinking that someone else will be the one to get Buggy and Alvida and everyone else.

Again, thank you very much for reviewing!

Revenge of the Clown

Chapter 3:Pursuit

"Nami, they've stopped!" called the marksman from the observation deck. As he was the one with goggles that worked as binoculars, he was the one who was in charge of keeping a lookout when it was important.

The navigator looked up from where she stood beside the ship's figurehead, on top of which the restless captain sat.

"Then we'll take advantage of that. Sanji-kun, Zoro, Robin, Luffy, Chopper! Get the oars and start rowing!"

"Of course, Nami-san!" The enthusiastic reply, naturally, came from the cook.

They all moved to do as she said. Zoro reluctantly, Chopper obediently, Luffy restlessly, and Sanji enthusiastically. Robin sat calmly on the edge of the ship with a cup of coffee, not making a single movement. Nami turned to glare at the archaeologist.

"Robin! Can't you ever look like you're actually doing something?" Exasperation filled the navigator's voice, though she knew that her words would be of no use. They had been through such conversations many times already, and the raven-haired woman never lost her cool, nor did she change her ways.

"I'm rowing," Robin replied simply, turning her eyes to the fuming red head. Indeed, four arms had sprouted on each side of the ship beside the oars, and were helping the four men row.

"I know you're _arms _are rowing, but…" Nami gestured helplessly. "Can't you ever give some sort of…well…visual?"

"I'll try my best," came Robin's usual reply as she returned to her coffee. Nami gave up. She had tried this same thing during the Davy Back Fight, and even then, she had only succeeded in having a conversation almost identical to this one, and both conversations had produced identical results.

Turning her eyes to the ocean lying ahead of the ship, she saw that the Clown Pirates' ship had come much closer. Those boys were quite strong, after all… At that moment, a sudden thought struck Nami. She spun around to look at the rowing men.

"Luffy! Do you think that you could extend your arm out to that ship from here? That way you could just hop over onto their ship, get back your hat, and come right back without causing so much trouble."

Luffy looked up at her, but before he could even open his mouth to reply, another call came down from the observation deck.

"Nami, they're starting up again! And this time in a different direction!"

"Which direction?" Nami asked sharply. She had checked her Logue Pose earlier, wondering if that was what they were following, but it had been pointing slightly to the right compared to the direction in which they were heading. This had made her nervous. If they were not following the Logue Pose, they either had collected their last Logue at a different island, or, more likely, they were following an Eternal Pose. If they were following an Eternal Pose, that meant that they had probably planned this whole thing. Which, in turn, meant that she and the rest of the crew on the ship were heading straight into a trap.

"Slightly to the right of the direction where they were heading before," replied the marksman. Nami furrowed her eyebrows, but turned to the rowing group.

"Put the helm to thirty degrees starboard!" Sanji and Chopper instantly rushed off to do as she instructed, and the captain looked at her for instruction.

"You stay there, Luffy," she said sharply. "Keep rowing until Sanji-kun and Chopper get back."

"Nami, how did you know where to go?" inquired the marksman from above.

"They're heading in the same direction now as the Logue Pose is pointing." The long-nosed boy looked down at her quizzically.

"Where are we heading to next?" Nami shot a sharp glare upwards.

"I'm a navigator, not a map," she said, her voice ice cold. "I don't know any more about the next island than you do." The marksman gave a nod, and instantly returned to watching the ship that moved ahead of them.

"Nami, if we keep doing this, we won't have any strength left to spare the enemy once we catch up," called Chopper. Nami looked back and saw that Chopper and Sanji had returned. She considered Chopper's words as the other three muttered their disagreement. Though it was true that the other three had monster-like strength, they also had a ridiculous extent of pride. She remembered a conversation in which Sanji and Zoro had agreed that they preferred to die rather than be disgraced. She was sure that they would never admit it if they tired. In Luffy's case, he never even noticed when he was tired. He would lose too much blood during fights and collapse, and still fail to realize that he was pushing himself too hard. As for Robin, she never complained anyway. Nami had no way of knowing why, whether it was pride or loyalty or something else, but though Robin was strong, she doubted that the woman could keep up the strenuous rowing for long without losing the strength to fight.

She had to agree with Chopper.

"Okay, no more rowing! Sanji-kun, Chopper, get back to the helm. Zoro, Robin, keep an eye out for anything out of the normal and help where you can find work to do. Luffy come here and see if you can reach their ship."

Luffy instantly did as she said, rushing up to the prow and stretching out his arm. For a moment, it looked like it would work. Luffy's hand caught the edge of the ship, and with a grin, he prepared to rock himself over. However, apparently someone on the other ship noticed what he was attempting. A sudden stabbing pain ran through his hand, and he let go with a yelp of pain.

"Luffy!" Nami and Usopp cried out in horror. He had already begun to rocket himself to the other ship when he had let go, and now was falling through the air midway between the ships, too surprised to think to extend an arm to either ship.

But Zoro was at the prow in an instant, holding out his hand.

"Luffy! Hold this!"

At the swordsman's call, Luffy's arm shot out, his hand taking that of the green haired man. With a strong swing of his arm, Zoro had Luffy back on the ship, though there was a shallow hole in the wood of the deck where the captain had crash-landed. Nami and Usopp let out identical sighs of relief as Sanji and Chopper came bolting out of the kitchen, where the helm was located.

"What's wrong, Nami-san?" called Sanji.

"Luffy just tried to rocket from this ship to that one," Nami said, her voice regaining its usual tone. "A really idiotic idea. His hand appears to have gotten stabbed on the other side, and he let go, ended up midway between both ships, and nearly fell into the ocean."

"'Idiotic idea'?" came the long-nosed boy's voice from above, as his head appeared to peer downwards. "It was your idea, Nami."

The navigator's head snapped up with a vicious expression.

"Of course it wasn't! Do you think that I would come up with such a silly idea?"

"Yes, seeing as you did," came the instant reply. However, the marksman ducked right back into the safety of the observation deck after saying his words. He knew the navigator's wrath too well to remain where she could see him after contradicting or defying her.

"Nami-san, you are always so admirable when correcting these ignorant idiots!"

The marksman snorted. He didn't have to look down or guess to figure out whom that was. That cook would never admit that Nami or Robin could do anything wrong. Peeking over the edge, he mentally rolled his eyes. Just looking down at everyone from up here, it looked as though nothing was out of place. No one would think that they were pursuing an enemy who had just stolen their captain's dearest treasure and once come dangerously close to beheading their captain as well. Sanji was swooning over Nami, Nami was snapping at him, Zoro sat against the edge of the ship beside the prow, his three swords leaning against his shoulder as he slept, Luffy sat on the figure head, laughing at the antics of his crew, Chopper was trying to convince Luffy to come down so he could treat his hand, and Robin sat on the edge of the ship with a cup of coffee, reading a book by the first sunrays of the morning. Only one thing let on that anything was wrong, and that was the lack of the straw hat on the captain's head.

Turning his eyes back to the front, he adjusted his goggles to look at the ocean that lay ahead. Looking through the goggles, he faintly could see a slight elevation in the distance. _The island,_ thought the marksman, shuddering to think what they would encounter there.

"Nami! I can see an island in the distance!" Usopp called down, shouting at the top of his voice to be heard over the squabbling—Chopper and Luffy were arguing over the treatment of Luffy's hand, Nami was shouting at everyone at their lack of concentration on the issue at hand, and Sanji and Zoro were arguing over something trivial.

At the marksman's words, Luffy stopped arguing and looked up, Chopper took advantage of his distraction to treat his hand, Nami stopped yelling and kicked Zoro and Sanji to silence them, and Robin looked up curiously from her book.

"Now that we're close enough that long-nose-kun can see the island, may I ask exactly what sort of enemy we're facing?"

Robin's question came before anyone had the chance to answer Usopp. Nami was the one to reply to Robin.

"Well, Buggy seems to have a grudge against Luffy for defeating him the first time they met. Buggy ate a Devil's Fruit that allows him to detach parts of his body from the rest. They also both appeared to know the person who gave Luffy that hat… I can't remember what the man's name was, but it sounded familiar. Then they met again in Logue Town, and that time Buggy's crew managed to trap Luffy on top of the death penalty platform, but Zoro and Sanji saved him."

Sanji and Zoro both froze at Nami's words. Zoro felt a chill run through his body, and Sanji suppressed a shudder. Now that they thought about it, they had never really told Nami and Usopp what had actually happened. The people they had met after that—Smoker and Tashigi—had become more important to think about, and the death penalty incident had been shoved to the back of their minds. But now both of them recalled it—the terror at having nearly lost their captain, the desperation to reach and platform and knock it down… And then their captain's words.

"Zoro! Sanji! Usopp! Nami!" their captain had called. Then, a big smile appeared on his face as he continued. "Sorry. I'm dead."

The two of them looked over at Luffy, who was looking at them as well. The captain, who was normally so readable, held an entirely unreadable expression on his face as he looked at them. Then he gave them a small smile before turning back to Nami and opening his mouth.

Sanji instantly felt a sense of dread. Was Luffy going to tell all the others of his failure? But Zoro felt differently. He had felt that that smile had been Luffy's way of saying, "don't worry. You tried harder than ever. I saw."

"Alvida joined Buggy, too," Luffy told Nami and Robin.

"Alvida?" asked Nami and Chopper quizzically as Usopp leaned out of the observation deck with interest.

"Yeah. She changed a lot, though. She ate a Devil's Fruit, too… I think she became slippery. She was the one that Coby used to work for, you know." The last part was directed at the swordsman, who Coby had also befriended. Zoro gave a little nod, and then, looking at his captain's face, made his decision. Luffy trusted all of them beyond measure. Now he would show that same trust in his fellow crewmates.

"You're wrong about one thing though, Nami." Sanji looked around at Zoro dubiously. "The love cook and I couldn't do a thing to help Luffy. We never got close enough to the platform in time."

"Yes, Nami-san," cut in Sanji, his voice serious for once as he spoke to her. "It was a bolt of lightning that saved Luffy. It struck the platform exactly, just moments before he was beheaded."

Glancing over at Luffy, Sanji was surprised to see a large, proud smile on his captain's face, directed at himself and the green-haired swordsman.

"Oh," said Nami. Then her eyes narrowed. "And why did none of us hear about this until now?"

As Zoro muttered in annoyance and Sanji began to swoon once more, Luffy grinned even more widely. Things were back to normal and no one had made a big deal about it. That was why they were _nakama._ Just then, Usopp's voice cut in, returning everyone to the problems of the present.

"Nami," he called. "I can see the island more clearly now. Could you come up here and see if you know it?"

The navigator instantly climbed up to the observation deck, and taking the marksman's goggles, looked at the island beyond the ship ahead of them thoughtfully. After a few minutes, she finally shook her head and returned the goggles.

"I have no idea," she said. "I already told you, I don't know much about the islands of Grand Line."

"If you'll allow me to look, I'm sure I could tell," said a feminine voice from behind the two of them. Swinging around with a jump of surprise, they saw that Robin had climbed up as well.

"There isn't enough room up here!" grumbled Usopp as he handed over the goggles. "This is made for one person, not two or three!" Robin and Nami ignored him, Robin looking out at the ocean through the goggles, and Nami watching her expectantly.

Slowly removing the goggles from her eyes, the archaeologist handed them back to the marksman, an indescribable expression on her face. It was not the one of terror as when she had seen Aokiji, but her cool and calm exterior had still dissolved, and this worried Nami.

"It's a dangerous island," Robin said before anyone could ask. "I can't specifically remember its name, but this is not good. It's a perfectly welcoming island if you go peacefully—full of people and shops… A lot like Logue Town. Only here, there are no marine bases. Instead, it's swarmed with White Beard's men."

"Is that bad?" asked Nami tentatively.

"Not ordinarily, no," replied Robin. "They usually don't try to fight unless you do something. But in our case, it's definitely bad. We're going to be fighting, and like I said, it's a crowded place. We're likely to injure some innocent bystanders. And not just any innocent bystanders—people who are close to White Beard." She looked at the two standing beside her. "You may know that White Beard is known as the strongest pirate, and he does not forgive when his men are hurt. It may not sound so bad now," she added with a sigh. "But when we get there, we'll be in mortal danger if we fight."

Nami and Usopp exchanged a glance.

"There's no chance of turning around and surrendering?" Usopp asked hopelessly.

"Luffy's hat, Usopp. It's Luffy's hat!"

The two of them exchanged another look of despair, and then looked down at their companions.

"This might be the last time that we're all together like this…" muttered Nami.

Usopp wanted to tell her not to say such things, that surely it would turn out all right, but he couldn't. He knew that she was right. Their luck was at an end.

A/N: Well? What do you think? _Nakama _is comrades or companions, by the way, if you don't already know. It just sounds better and stronger as _nakama_, which is why I used it there…

This time, I'm asking for five more reviews before I update. So review!


	4. White Island

Replies to reviews:

Sandblasted-Kitten: Yup (about Luffy's hand being stabbed); must have been painful. But knowing him, he won't ever even mention it again… I'm really glad that you like it!

Smartz: (grins) Thanks for the complements! That's what I try to do, actually. My hardest task, I find, is keeping everyone in character while, at the same time, following the plot that I made myself. I started trying when I was thirteen, and those fics were just plain awful. I deleted them recently, and decided to try and start over. 'Forgotten Dream', a Sailor Moon fanfic, and this are my two new attempts.

xXSanji-kunXx (and Bon Clay): Well, here they are, actually on the island! Granted, it's only the dock, but still… Hope you like it!

babe300: (laughs sheepishly) Actually, I've no idea who's going to defeat Buggy and Alvida myself. It could just be Luffy, Sanji and Robin, or it could be someone else… Well, we'll both see how it turns out in the end! I know the feeling of liking reviews turning up in stories. I like it when my reviews are replied to as well… It makes me almost as happy as I get when I see that someone has reviewed one of my stories.

VM: I'm really glad that you like it. I hope that you like the fighting scenes (though there will be more in the next chapter as well)—this is my first time writing them. Don't worry, I counted your review as five, and here's the update! It's just a little delayed because of a farewell party I attended at school, and then my cousin visited for the first time in a month or so. Well, I hope that you aren't disappointed!

Revenge of the Clown

Chapter 4:White Island

"No…"

The rest of the Clown Pirates could only ignore their captain's muttering. He had begun to mutter when he had first seen the island ahead of them and identified it as White Island, the residence of a number of White Beard's men. In other words, the worst place for a fight.

However, they had docked, and the Straw Hat Pirates were growing ever closer. Most felt that it was time for their captain to pull himself together. But then again, Buggy was the only one who knew what White Beard's wrath could be like.

Finally deciding to pull himself together, captain Buggy turned to his men.

"Listen. Fighting on this island gives us a very slim chance of survival. You men take that thief girl, long-nosed coward, and the black-haired woman. Kabaji, take Roronoa and finish him off as swiftly as you can. Mohji, take the man with the blond hair. He must be relatively strong. Alvida and I will take care of Straw Hat. Once you finish your charge, help finish off anyone else. This needs to be done as rapidly as possible."

"Dear," cut in Alvida. "Do you think it wise to leave Nico Robin to the lesser men?"

Buggy turned to stare at her.

"'Nico Robin'? Who?"

"The black haired woman that we spoke to. You apparently don't know, but she became a bounty head of over seventy million at the age of eight."

Everyone seemed to go deathly pale instantly. The lesser men exchanged terrified glances, and Mohji, Kabaji and Buggy just stared at Alvida in horror.

"Why didn't you say something earlier!" Buggy's voice seemed to be cracking with strain. Everything seemed to be going wrong at once.

Alvida shrugged.

"Because I assumed that you knew, of course. The woman is quite well-known after all."

Buggy faltered for a moment, but soon regained his voice.

"Fine, then. Half of you men go with Alvida and kill that woman. I can take on Straw Hat on my own." The men, however, appeared to be staring at something behind him in horror.

He turned back to look at the ship that was approaching, wondering what was alarming his men. Instantly, Buggy's face met a fist that sent him flying backwards. Holding a hand to his nose in pain, Buggy looked up in time to see a familiar form landing safely before him and all his men.

As Buggy pulled out his daggers, he saw his men doing so as well.

"No, you morons!" he called angrily as he turned his eyes to the glaring, black-haired youth. "Watch for the others!"

But it was too late. A group of ten men charged at the young pirate, their daggers brandished menacingly. The young man stood calmly as they approached. A moment before the closest man had reached him, however, he extended his arm and gripped a roof. Pulling himself swiftly into the air, he narrowly escaped the dagger that had been heading for his chest.

Not turning to watch the ten men cry out in pain as their daggers, already carrying too much momentum to stop so abruptly, cut their comrades, the hatless Straw Hat braced his legs as he flew through the air.

"Gomu gomu no…" Suddenly his right leg shot out, extending as it did so, and sweeping about twenty of the lesser men off their feet. "Whip!"

Luffy knew well that this attack would not even knock out the majority. He also knew, however, that if he caused as much damage as possible, it would make it easier for his comrades when they reached the dock.

The men that he had kicked flew in all directions. Buggy and Alvida watched in horror from the dock, Nami, Usopp and Robin from the observation deck of the ship, as a number of passersby were knocked off their feet as a result of the attack as well.

Nami looked close to tears.

"We are so dead…"

"We should just run now…" muttered Usopp, more to himself than Nami. She looked to Usopp in hopeless frustration.

"This isn't just any silly fight that Luffy randomly picked, Usopp. It's his hat. His _hat!_ We can't run away without that!"

As they approached the dock, Zoro and Sanji leapt out of the ship, just as Luffy, with a shout of "gomu gomu no fireworks!" sent a great number of people flying, including passersby. Two of Zoro's swords were out before he landed, and Sanji's left leg was braced for landing, his right for kicking. A split second after they reached the ground, the lesser men were scattered on the ground throughout the area, unconscious.

"Please!" cried Nami. Having climbed down from the observation deck, she and Robin stood at the prow of the ship as Usopp lowered the anchor. "It's dangerous! Don't hurt the passersby! Or anyone else that isn't part of Buggy's pirate ship!"

"It's useless, navigator-san. They're men." Robin's quiet words came even before the swordsman and cook replied.

"Humph. They get in my way, I get rid of them." As he spoke, Zoro removed the bandana around his upper arm and unsheathed his third sword, placing it in his mouth and regaining his grip on the other two.

"If they don't want to be hurt, they can always stay away, Nami-san." Sanji's right leg was rising for another attack.

"Come on…" But the frightened navigator's weak pleas went unheard as the strongest members of Buggy's ship took up places with their appointed opponent.

"Anyone who can get up, get the red-haired girl and the long-nosed boy!" shouted Buggy as Luffy stood and faced him with a fierce glare.

"Give me back my hat," growled the normally easy-going captain. Buggy smirked in reply.

"What makes you think I still have it? I could have easily tied it to a stone and thrown it into the ocean, couldn't I?"

With a roar of rage, Luffy's fist shot out.

"Bara bara emergency escape!" shouted Buggy as his head jumped off his shoulders and Luffy's fist flew through midair, missing his target. Buggy snorted as the boy clasped the corner of a house with his outstretched hand and pulled himself forward for a second attack. Buggy stepped easily out of his path.

"You need new fighting techniques," he said lazily. "You used all this the first time we fought."

But Luffy's arm extended unexpectedly as he flew past Buggy, bringing the large nosed man with him. The two of them crashed into a house, which collapsed on top of them.

When Zoro had found himself facing the man who had fought so dirtily the previous time, he found himself smirking.

"You couldn't beat me when I had my stomach sliced open. What makes you think that you can beat me now?"

"You appear to have gained no knowledge at all in the time that we have been apart, Roronoa Zoro. People become stronger. I have become much stronger than I was at our last encounter. Indeed-" Kabaji dug his sword into the dirt below him and threw it up, creating a cloud of dust that effectively cut off Zoro's vision. Suddenly, a sword came flying out of the cloud. "I have learned enough that I can now easily defeat you." Zoro met the sword with one of his own, creating a loud clanging sound as their swords met. As the dust cleared, he saw Kabaji, now on his unicycle, giving a triumphant smile.

As he raised the sword in his other hand to attack, Kabaji swiftly swept his sword between Zoro's in an attempt to inflict a wound. But Zoro easily cut off that stroke with the sword that had been rising for attack, raising the one that had been defending in attack. Kabaji swiftly pedaled backwards, avoiding the swing.

"-As fast as you can!" he suddenly heard Nami shouting.

_Yes,_ he thought, _I have to finish this guy off as quickly as possible. Nami and Robin were saying something about some guy…_

As Kabaji regained an attacking stance, Zoro readied his own.

"Oni…" He crossed the two swords in his hands as Kabaji approached. "Giri!" His swords swung forwards with full force as soon as Kabaji was in range.

Recognizing the attack a split second before it hit, Kabaji put up his sword between the two that Zoro held in his hands, allowing himself to be thrown heavily backwards, but not sliced open.

"Well then," he heard Zoro say as he righted his body. "You do appear to be stronger, but not enough to defeat me."

Without bothering to reply, Kabaji pedaled backwards on his unicycle, then jumped into the air, bringing the cycle with him. As he came down on Zoro, he saw the green haired man calmly walking out from under him. Outraged that his foe should be so unfazed, he swept the sword out to the side, cutting a gash in Zoro's side.

Zoro gave a grunt, but instantly swing around, bringing his swords with him. Kabaji leapt backwards off of his unicycle, and the cycle was cut to pieces. Kabaji felt himself go pale.

"That was…metal…" Zoro smirked in reply to Kabaji's sudden nervousness.

"That's right. Still think you can defeat me?" With that, he dashed forward.

What followed was a clanging of swords so fast that neither of them could tell what was what. Swords slashed, blocked, stabbed and deflected so rapidly that they seemed to be a blur, and the clanging seemed to be one long sound. Finally, when Kabaji retreated, there was blood dripping from a slash across his cheek as well as one across his stomach. There was a deep gash across Zoro's chest, reopening the wound that had been the mark of his failure to achieve his dream.

Zoro choked with the pain. Kabaji, upon seeing his enemy's condition, grinned, forgetting his own pain, and dashed forwards, chuckling triumphantly.

"This is the end, Roronoa! Look back and regret having underestimated me when you go to the next world!"

Zoro, recovering from the initial wave of pain, had two swords raised above his head, his third one sheathed at his hip. Abruptly, his head snapped up to look at Kabaji, still the width of a house ahead of him.

"Seventy-two Pound Rifle!" Unable to even comprehend what had happened, wounds appeared on Kabaji's chest moments after Zoro brought down his swords in a strong swing, sending him flying backwards.

Kabaji lay unmoving, and Zoro collapsed to the ground.

"What _are _you wearing?"

This had been Sanji's first comment upon facing his opponent. He could understand someone with Luffy's level of intelligence wanting to play dress-up in fluffy bunny costumes while on the ship, but even Luffy wouldn't appear in battle wearing a bunny costume. Then again, maybe it was for terror purposes. A fluffy rabbit riding a lion was, in a way, terrifying…

Mohji instantly shot a glare at his opponent. This man did not look particularly strong. He did not have muscles or weapons like the swordsman, and he did not appear to have eaten a Devil's Fruit either. Nope, definitely not anyone worth his time.

"I am not _wearing_ anything, you insolent boy! This is my own hair!"

"Hair?" Sanji repeated with a snort. "That's fur. What are you, a cross between a rabbit and a human? Those two must have had major mental problems."

"Who do you think you are?" As he spoke, Mohji shot out a leg at Sanji, fully intending to kick him right through his own ship.

However, Sanji was quicker. Slipping to the side to avoid Mohji's foot, he shot his own foot at the lion's neck. When the lion swatted his foot out of the way with its paw, Sanji drew back in surprise. He had thought that the lion was only some sort of vehicle, but it seemed that it was also a weapon.

His leg shot out again, this time at the furry man on the lion's back. The lion leapt over Sanji's head, avoiding the kick. When Sanji attempted to aim another kick, the lion stepped to the side.

After the lion had avoided six of his kicks, Sanji found himself very annoyed.

"Just get out of my way, you idiot!" he shouted as he aimed an unplanned, unexpected kick at the lion's neck. This time his kick found its mark, and the lion flew straight through the Clown Pirates' ship and into the sea.

"Richie!" called Mohji in horror. But no sooner had he said that than Sanji's foot met his back, and he was thrown through the air, hitting a lamppost.

Sanji waited for the man to get up, but he did not. The man had already lost consciousness. Sanji was about to criticize this, when he heard a woman's scream from their ship.

"Nami-san! Robin-chan!"

Not wasting a moment, Sanji was rushing back to the ship, the fluffy bunny-man forgotten.

Luffy's head finally popped out of the side of the pile of rubble that had once been a house and he breathed heavily. He had been digging frantically for what felt like a very long time. He was rubber and therefore could not be harmed by anything falling on him as long as it wasn't sharp, but he had been unable to breathe. When he felt like his lungs were working normally again, he looked around. Though Buggy was nowhere in sight, Luffy saw his swordsman deliver the final blow to his opponent, and watched Kabaji fall as he proceeded to dig the rest of his body out. Just when he had gotten his whole body out of the pile, he saw Zoro collapse as well.

As though he could feel his captain's eyes on him, Zoro's eyes opened again almost as soon as he hit the ground. Upon seeing Luffy, he let out a grunt.

"I'm sleeping, Luffy."

"Sure. I'll get Big Nose." Zoro gave a small grin in response before closing his eyes and promptly falling asleep.

Luffy then looked around, absently bringing his hand to his head to secure his hat out of habit. Feeling only hair beneath his fingers, he remembered with a jolt why they were fighting Buggy in the first place. A new rage swelled, and the black haired boy began to dig rapidly through the pile of rubbish. He threw pieces of the house behind him, failing to hear the grunts of pain and cries of outrage that came from behind as pieces of rubble struck a number of uninvolved residents of the island.

Suddenly, Luffy sensed something behind him and spun around, moving slightly to the side as he did so. The dagger held by Buggy's detached hand, which had been aiming straight for his heart, ran through his shoulder instead. Laughing, Buggy released the dagger and his hand returned to its place on his wrist.

"Don't you know not to turn your back on your enemies during battle? Shanks never did teach you much, did he? Then again, that moron didn't ever know anything himself, either."

Buggy's laughing taunt heightened Luffy's anger, and he rushed forward in a rage.

"I told you before" -Buggy hastily scattered his body parts to avoid injury- "not to insult Shanks" –but Luffy's arm stretched out and grabbed his head- "because _he_" –Luffy swung the face around to face himself angrily as he pulled the skin on the cheeks to keep him from dividing himself even further- "is a much greater man" –Buggy began to mutter protests in pain, but went unheard- "than _you _could ever _hope_ to be!" As he finished, Luffy slammed the head down to the ground angrily. Buggy gave a sharp gasp of pain.

Then, regaining control of himself, his hands came to drag Luffy away from himself as his parts reassembled themselves.

"Where's my hat?" Luffy's question was sharp.

"I told you! Bara-"

"Don't you _dare_ take yourself apart again!" called Luffy, a leg swinging out and knocking down the other pirate, who had just got to his feet. Buggy hit the ground with an "oof" as Luffy's leg extended up into the sky.

"Gomu gomu no…" the foot came rapidly down. "Axe!"

As his foot slammed down onto the stomach of his foe, causing the large nosed pirate to choke as he gasped for breath, an angry voice rang through the area.

"What _is _this?"

Author's Note:

Okay, that's this chapter. This was the first fighting scene that I've ever written, so it was a little difficult… But I'm having a lot of fun writing this story! I just have to take care that I don't start having _too_ much fun, because then characters would start to go out of character… Anyway, any comments? Criticisms? Anything? I noticed by the hit rate that a lot of people are reading this, but not reviewing.

Again, five or six reviews before I update. And if you leave me some constructive criticism or ideas, that would be very helpful!


	5. Robin vs Alvida

Author's Note: I'm so sorry for the delay! I was searching my room for something—a certain piece of paper, actually, which is very difficult when you have a bed piled high with nothing but books and papers (I have a habit of sleeping on the rug on the floor, I find that more comfortable) and a closet filled with who knows what. So I spent two entire days cleaning out every corner of my room—my bed, closet, bookcase and desk—and rearranging everything so that I can find it. This resulted in my being unable to write the chapter, and what's worse, I still haven't found that paper. I really want to find that thing…

Anyway, on to replies to reviews:

xXSanji-kunXx (and Bon Clay): Actually, I originally was going to make Sanji think of the Easter Bunny, but I'm trying to do 'believable' here, and since the original is in Japanese, and they don't have the Easter Bunny…

Sandblasted Kitten: I think that was the last time… I can't be sure, though.

VM: Thanks! Actually, now I think of it, I did something resembling a fight scene before, in a story I wrote for a friend… But it doesn't strike me as much of a fight, so… Anyway, there's still more fighting to come. Sorry for the delay! I already wrote down my excuse, but…

babe300: Interesting idea! I like it, but I can't use it in this chapter (Sanji doesn't make an appearance, nor does he come in contact with Alvida or Nami—that part is set while he's still fighting Mohji), but I think I'll see if I can use some of it… The only thing is, he's kind of powerless against Alvida, too—true, he can't hug her because she'd slip out of his arms, but neither can he kick her, because his foot would slip. My favorite character? Hm… I've never given that much thought… Luffy, Zoro and Nami are my favorites, I guess, and lately my liking of Robin has been increasing too… Luffy because he's easy to look up to—he has this leading quality about him, but he doesn't think too deeply into things, just lives on impulse. I'm a bit like that too (that I live on impulse a lot of the time, I mean), which is why I like him, I guess. I like Zoro for his determination and his loyalty and faith. With Nami, my heart just went out to her with the Arlong thing. Robin—she's been living for twenty years betraying everyone around her to live, and I think that it takes a lot of will power to suddenly change that, no matter how much she likes her new comrades. But she did, which is why I've liked her more and more lately. But I also liked her before that for her passion about history. No offense to Sanji, of course. (grins)

purple-lilas: (nods enthusiastically) Thanks for picking up on that! You'll see in this chapter (even though it's only mentioned once) that he's hiding unhelpfully behind the main mast…

Revenge of the Clown

Chapter 5:Robin vs Alvida

Nami looked on in horror as Luffy, Zoro and Sanji began fighting their respective opponents.

"Robin," she practically whimpered as she looked to the side to the other woman who stood watching calmly. "Can't you do something? They're all going to die! Look at the number of people they've hurt already! Can't you just end the fights quickly before they do anything worse?"

Robin looked to her terrified roommate, and began to lift her hands.

"Oh, no you don't. Let your comrades fight their own fights." A crack followed these words, and Robin instinctively ducked. The bullet scraped her cheek.

"You might not know me," said a woman, stepping gracefully over the rails at the edge of the ship where she had been sitting, a metal club held over her shoulder in her right hand, and a gun that she was tucking back into her waistband held in her left hand. "But I recognize you quite well, you know. You must have so many people after you with a bounty like that over your head… I expect that you must have eaten a Devil's Fruit, am I correct? Of course, there should be no need to ask—how else could an eight year old bring six marine ships to ruin?"

Robin did not speak, but her eyes narrowed in concentration as her arms crossed above her chest.

"Seis fleur," she said, her voice still calm. Two arms sprouted out of Alvida's hips, one from the ground near her right foot, two from the ground near her left foot, and one from between her shoulder blades. The two arms that had sprouted from her hips each reached around in front of one of Alvida's arms, then clasped hands behind her neck, bending her body backwards as two arms sprouting from the ground pulled from the back of her knees and the one sprouting from her back reached around to pull her head backwards. The second arm by Alvida's left leg wrapped around the bottom of the leg to twist it. Alvida stood calmly as the arms wrapped about her.

"So, you have eaten a Devil's Fruit," she commented, appearing completely unfazed as Robin's arms tightened. "But I'm sorry to say that your abilities are useless against mine."

As soon as she finished speaking, Robin's arms that had gone around her neck and arms slipped off over Alvida's arms, the one that had gone around her head slipped from her head, and the ones around her legs slipped down off her legs. In Robin's surprise, the arms retreated back into the ground rapidly and disappeared.

"Now do you see?" asked Alvida with a smile. "I have skin so smooth that any attack slips from it. Nothing can harm my perfect skin."

With this, she lifted her club and darted forwards. As she brought the club down on Robin, Robin stood her ground.

"Tres fleur," she murmured, and three arms appeared—one each from the top of Robin's shoulders, and one from Alvida's right shoulder. The arm on Alvida's shoulder reached out to grip the handle of the club as well, holding it back. The two arms on Robin's shoulders caught the club as she attempted to swing it down.

Robin had underestimated Alvida's strength, however, and though she managed to avoid being hit in the head with the metal club, she was sent reeling backwards with the force of the blow, colliding into a pile of barrels that had been left out on the deck. The barrels went tumbling down to the lower deck, where Usopp and Chopper were watching, half hidden behind the main mast in fear.

"Robin…"

Hearing Nami give a frightened whimper, Robin a twinge of panic. She could manage to protect only herself, but she had three others to protect as well. She shot her eyes up to look determinedly at her opponent. She had lived her life betraying those close to herself in order to live on. But this time, she would fight to the end and protect her friends.

While she had been regaining her balance, Alvida had turned on Nami. Nami had hastily taken out her Clima Tact, but it was obvious that Usopp had not made it strong enough to protect her from a swing of Alvida's club.

"Seis fleur!" called Robin, and two arms sprouted from each of Nami's shoulders as well as Alvida's right shoulder. The six arms held back the club, this time successfully. Alvida pulled back her club and Robin's arms sank back into the Alvida and Nami's shoulders. When Alvida turned on Robin, she still did not appear fazed at all.

"So, you still think that you can fight me?" she asked in a gentle voice that nevertheless held a tone of unkindness and strength.

Without warning, she hurled her club at Robin. With no time to think, Robin grew as many forearms as she could from her elbow, positioning them in front of her chest just as the club hit.

As she was thrown backwards, Robin bit back a cry of pain. The spikes on the club had made multiple wounds in her arms, and when she hit one of the fallen barrels, she felt something sharp dig into her back, and this time could not suppress the whimper that escaped her lips.

When she staggered up to look behind herself, cursing her luck, she saw that a nail had not been properly hammered in and was sticking out right where the middle of her back had been thrown.

Turning her eyes back to her opponent, she saw the woman smirking victoriously as she swung her club down again, obviously intending to finish Robin off.

Robin seized her calm demeanor, refusing to let any terror, panic, or doubt to escape her. As she pressed down on those emotions, they soon were once again trapped in the bottom of her heart, and she could once more think clearly.

She had achieved this in less than a second, and her calculating eyes watched the club swing down at her head. When she knew that the club had gained too much momentum to stop, Robin gracefully stepped to the side, only narrowly avoiding being hit on the shoulder. As Alvida staggered forward, Robin seized a handful of her hair and threw her at the barrel from which a nail stuck out.

But to Robin's surprise, the barrel slipped out of the way as soon as Alvida hit it, and when she hit the ground, the beautiful woman went on sliding until she hit the wall. Alvida stood, not appearing to be affected by her blow in the least. However, Robin did notice that she was attempting to hide a wince.

Robin gave a mental sigh. _Of course—I should have known. Anything that hits her or that she hits will only slip. But my pulling her hair did affect her._

But unexpectedly, Alvida drew her gun and shot, doing so in a motion so graceful and swift that the bullet hit her before Robin had time to think to move. Her right shoulder jerked back as though someone had shoved it, and her left hand flew up to stop the blood. However, no sound escaped her lips this time, and she raised her face to look at her foe.

"You haven't had enough practice with a gun," Robin said tauntingly. "You missed my heart."

"Who said that I was trying to kill you with that shot?" questioned Alvida, smirking back. "Don't assume. I want you to die a slow and painful death." At these words, Robin's taunting smile widened.

"Really? You were trying to finish me off just a moment ago with your club. What made you change your mind? I was under the impression that you wanted to be done with me as quickly as possible." Alvida's face flushed despite her efforts to stop it. Robin's eyes relaxed.

"What difference does it make?" asked Alvida, refusing to allow her pride to be hurt. "You're going to die either way—you are powerless against me!"

"Am I?" Robin asked calmly. "Uno fleur." A single arm sprouted from between Alvida's shoulder blades again, but this time it did not attempt to strangle her. Instead, the hand reached down, grabbing a fist full of the other woman's coal black, wavy hair. In one flowing motion, the arm gave a great tug, and Alvida gave a cry of pain.

"How dare you?" cried the woman in fury. "Don't you know how to fight properly? This isn't a silly girls' childish fight! This is a real battle! Or do you not know the difference?" Robin ignored the insult, remaining calm as she replied.

"Of course. In a real battle, the only real object is to survive. I've found that I can't hurt you by any blows to your body, but pulling your hair hurts you where nothing else does. I don't believe that I'm doing anything out of the ordinary." As Robin spoke, Alvida was already raising her club for another attempt at a finishing blow.

This time, Robin did nothing. The arm that still held a handful of Alvida's hair gave another tug, this time harder than the last. Alvida gave another cry of pain. This time, before even fully recovering from the pain, Alvida swung her club around to her back, bringing it down between her own shoulder blades to crush the arm that was tormenting her.

Only the arm was no longer there, and Alvida's club slipped at the impact with her skin, throwing her backwards and into an uncomfortable position. Robin seized the opportunity to dart over to the other woman, seizing her by the hair once more, and this time throwing her over the railing of the boat and into the sea.

Robin gave a sigh of relief.

But that sigh came a moment too soon. Alvida threw out her club to the side, catching Robin's back and throwing her overboard as well. Robin, quickly recovering from her shock, reached toward the ship's railing, extending her arm by growing another from her palm, and another from the palm of the hand at the end of that arm.

Just as she had almost reached the railing, however, the club came down on her stomach, and Robin cursed herself for failing to watch her enemy again. She cringed for a moment with the pain, attempting to ignore it and reach up toward the railing again. But that one moment had been too long a pause. Her back touched the cold water of the ocean, and as she felt the weakness overtake her, she knew that there was no hope left.

The last thing that she heard before her head was submerged was the navigator's scream.

The spectators and participants of the fight who were both conscious and near enough to have heard the man's words stared at him. Suddenly many of the spectators, presumably those who were members of the White Beard pirate crew, began to cheer. Buggy had turned deathly pale. Luffy was the only one who appeared unfazed at the appearance of the newcomer.

The man's eyes slowly took in the area—they looked at the men sprawled across the ground, both members of Buggy's crew and visitors and residents of White Island. When he saw Zoro's body among those, his eyes paused on the green haired man, his brows furrowing in confusion.

"That man…"

With an almost inaudible murmur, his eyes swept across the spectators, finally falling on Luffy and Buggy. Buggy instantly turned even whiter, and began to stammer in a horse voice.

"It wasn't- I'm not- I didn't hurt any of those men—really, I didn't. That- all of it- it was all Straw Hat's fault! I don't know if you're familiar with him, but he's quite violent, and was attacking me and my crew…" Buggy trailed off as it became evident that the man wasn't listening.

The man's eyes had widened upon seeing Luffy, and appeared to be speechless. Suddenly, Luffy's face broke into a smile.

"Ace! I didn't expect to see you here! What are you doing here?" His older brother finally appeared to regain use of his larynx.

"What am _I _doing here?" Ace asked his younger brother incredulously. "This is where most of the people under my charge are! This island is famous for that! Didn't you hear?"

"Really?" asked Luffy in surprise, looking around for the first time since he had reached White Island. "I didn't know. Big Nose stole my hat. I just want it back. And that's what I'm trying to do."

Ace's eyebrows rose in surprise, and for the first time, his eyes turned to look at Buggy. Buggy gulped.

"Hey, weren't you the pirate who was having a feast?" Buggy began to stammer in an attempted answer, but Ace cut him off. "Never mind, it doesn't matter. Why did you steal by little brother's hat?"

"Well, you see…" Buggy attempted to think frantically as he began to speak. "I've met the Straw Hats before, you see, and one of the men under me has a rivalry with Straw Hat's swordsman, Roronoa Zoro, and wanted to attempt to avenge his own defeat, and I knew that that hat was important to Straw Hat, so I thought that if I took it, he'd come after me, only one of the men under me broke the Eternal Pose, so we were forced to follow the Logue Pose here." Luffy stared.

"How does everything become everyone else's fault? Don't you know that you shouldn't blame things on other people?" Buggy twitched nervously. However, to the surprise of both Buggy and the spectators, who were now silent, Ace only shrugged.

"So you two have a rivalry of sorts. It isn't my place to interfere with that. There are only two things that concern be right now." He turned his eyes, which held a harsh light that was rarely seen in them, to Buggy. "My brother's hat, and" –his eyes turned to Luffy- "my comrades."

The smile was gone from Luffy's face as he nodded, his expression serious. Buggy suddenly bolted off in the direction of his ship. Both brothers' heads snapped around to his direction, and before he knew what was happening, a hand was dragging him back by his collar, he was thrown to the ground and suddenly felt himself burning as something heavy hit his stomach.

"Luffy's hat." Ace's words were cold, short, slow and threatening.

"It's on-on the d-deck of the ship," gasped Buggy, and Luffy had disappeared in a flash. The burning weight did not leave his stomach, however. The burning, in fact, spread. Suddenly, his whole body was burning hot, and then Buggy the Clown knew no more.

Ace waited until he saw that his brother had his hat before burning the man under his foot entirely. Removing his foot, he looked straight at his returning little brother.

"We have an issue to discuss," Ace told his brother solemnly. His eyes held a harsh light as he spoke.

Luffy looked at his elder brother straight in the eye as he replied.

"Yes."

Author's Note:

It may be unfair of me to be saying something like this after not keeping my word and updating, but I'm going to say it anyway… I'm not making a necessary number of reviews this time. Instead, I'm asking you readers to vote. Here's the thing: I'm not sure whether Ace should let Luffy go after this, forgiving him since he knows how important that hat is to his little brother, or whether he should do his duty, which would mean that Luffy and Ace would fight. Tell me which you think I should do. It would be nice if you could give me reasons, but it isn't necessary if you can't think of any. It actually isn't much of a vote because if, for example, I get multiple reviews saying one thing with no reasons, and one review saying the opposite with what I consider a good reason, chances are that I would choose the latter. (I don't care what sort of reasons they are. Just please tell me.)

Anyway, I won't update until I have a sufficient amount of opinions to start writing the next chapter.


	6. Fear

Author's Note: Thank you very much for giving me your opinions, everyone! It was very helpful! You'll probably notice that I didn't use any ideas outright, but the ideas were what inspired this chapter. It's a sort of merging of your suggestions and my own ideas, I guess. But there was just one idea that, though it was the most common suggestion, I couldn't use—the appearance of White Beard. The thing is, with White Beard, I know nothing about him apart from his appearance, and the fact that he seems a little overconfident. I don't know what it is that makes him so strong, or what his personality is like. I know, I could make the stuff up, but… So I apologize to those people who I have disappointed in my decision.

This chapter is dedicated to all my reviewers, on whose suggestions this chapter was written.

Replies to Reviews:

purple-lilas: Like I said above, I can't use that, I'm very sorry… But thank you for your opinion!

babe300: Thanks for the ideas! I know I never used any of them outright, but they inspired what happened in this chapter—hope you like it!

Midori: Interesting… The only thing is, I can't really get White Beard in the story for reasons mentioned above… Thanks very much for the ideas!

VM: Yes, everyone generally seems to agree that Ace and Luffy should fight… Hope you like this chapter, although it might be something that wasn't quite expected or welcome…

Lavagirl: Very interesting idea… Thanks!

Revenge of Clown

Chapter 6:Fear

"Nami-san! Robin-chan!"

Nami, Usopp and Chopper heard the call and knew who was coming before they saw the blond-haired cook. The cook jumped onto the deck soon after the three on board heard his calls.

"Nami-san! Are you alright?" His eyes swept over the ship deck swiftly. "What are all these people? What did they do to you?" His voice was angry, as though he intended to attack the men who were already knocked out.

"Sanji-kun!" Nami rushed over to him, his words not even appearing to have reached her ears. "Robin and Alvida fell into the water! You have to go save Robin!" Sanji's eyes widened.

"Robin-chan!" In an instant, he was rushing towards the edge of the boat. When he reached the edge and was about to jump, however, he abruptly halted. "Wait—who's Alvida?"

"The woman Robin was fighting, go save Robin!" Nami, Usopp and Chopper all called out in unison. Before they had even completed their sentence, however, there was a splash and Sanji was underwater.

The three crewmates rushed to the ship's edge and stared down into the dark water, cursing the fact that they could see nothing.

"It's taking so long…" Chopper muttered nervously.

"Idiot, it can't be more than twenty seconds since Sanji went down! It's got to take longer than that!" Usopp made the reply, but his voice and body were shaking with anxiety. Nami only stared down into the water, tightly gripping the railing.

"It's taking much too long," Chopper muttered again after a pause.

This time neither Usopp nor Nami said anything, only giving him their silent agreement.

"Three minutes," Nami murmured to herself.

"Well," Usopp licked his lips uneasily, "Sanji didn't go down immediately after they went down, right? So it must take some time to reach her, and it could be hard to get back up again, especially holding a person who's being dragged downwards…"

Nami and Chopper looked at him anxiously.

"You mean Sanji might have drowned?" Chopper asked, his expression immediately turning to one of alarm.

"Idiot, I never said that!" shouted Usopp. "I only said that it could take some time! Not-"

A splash and a gasp from below caused him to stop and look. Sanji had surfaced, gasping, and apparently struggling to keep his head above water. His arms appeared to be pulling him downwards.

"Sanji-kun!" Usopp and Chopper looked to the side to see Nami throwing down a rope, tied into a loop at the end. "Put Robin in here!"

"Thank you, Nami-san!" Sanji said in gasps, attempting a smile and doing as he was told, transferring Robin from his left arm into the loop. When Robin was in the loop, Nami began to struggle to pull it up.

"Help me, Usopp!" her words were accompanied by a glare, and Usopp rushed to obey. They pulled their raven-haired friend up until she was level with the top of the rail.

"Hold on to the rope, Usopp," Nami instructed as she let go. Usopp was about to protest when she walked over to the railing and began to pull Robin's body onto the deck. As they laid her down and Chopper began to attend to her, Sanji appeared at the side of the ship, pulling himself up with his legs and left hand, and still appearing weighed down by his right hand. As he climbed over the railing and pulled his right hand over as well, Nami and Usopp stared, and Chopper gaped, forgetting to care for Robin.

"S-Sanji!" cried Chopper in dismay.

"Qu-quick! Kick her into the ocean, as far away as you can!" Usopp yelled from where he was hiding behind the main mast once more.

Sanji frowned.

"Usopp, you really don't have any manners. That's not how you treat a lady!" The blond cook's voice was cold and menacing.

"Sanji-kun, you idiot, that's our enemy!" Nami screamed at him as the beautiful woman began to cough and stir.

Sanji turned to Nami in surprise.

"Nami-san, of course! I could never doubt your words!"

"Then quick, kick her overboard!" the navigator cried.

"Of course!" He aimed a hard kick at the woman's back, but to his surprise, as his foot came in contact with it, he found himself stumbling forward and hitting the railing, and the woman unaffected. "What the…"

The cook was suddenly looking at the woman with wide, serious eyes.

"Get her _out!_" screamed Nami again and a second later her stick had hit the woman on the hips, and the woman was flying over board once more.

"Ah!" cried Sanji in dismay as he watched the woman fly through the air.

"Don't you dare!"

As he attempted to leap into the ocean once more, he found himself held back by the collar by a very angry orange-haired woman.

"But Nami-san!" Sanji protested.

"I told you, she is an _enemy!_ Even you couldn't possibly defeat her were she conscious."

"Nami-san, you wound me!" Sanji announced dramatically, appearing to forget the other woman. "I would protect you from anything and everything! There is nothing that can get past me when I have you to protect!"

Nami rolled her eyes and released him.

"What are all these people?" came a calm but tired voice from behind them. The four crewmates wheeled around to see the archaeologist conscious, sitting up against the railing.

"Robin-chan! You're alright! I was so worried! Would you like a drink?" Sanji was swooning again as Nami's eyes passed over the unconscious men scattered around the deck.

"While you were fighting Alvida, these guys came and tried to finish the three of us"-she indicated herself, Usopp and Chopper-"off. Needless to say, they weren't that strong and didn't succeed."

"I see." A small smile appeared on her lips as Robin turned to Sanji. "And yes, I would appreciate cold coffee, if that isn't too much trouble."

"Of course, I would be delighted!" said Sanji as he happily headed for the kitchen.

"Now we just have to wait for Luffy and Zoro," said Usopp when the kitchen door had closed.

"Yes," agreed Nami. "Then we'll leave this island as soon as possible."

At this, Robin raised an eyebrow.

"But navigator-san?"

"Hm?" Nami looked questioningly at the older woman.

"What about the Logue? We don't have any Eternal Pose to depend on." Nami looked down at her wrist and paled.

"I'd forgotten… And the Logue hasn't collected yet!"

"I wouldn't worry until captain-san and swordsman-san get here. They could be longer than you expect, you know."

Nami, Usopp and Chopper looked worriedly at Robin at these words.

"These were my comrades, Luffy."

Ace's voice was dark as he spoke.

"I know that you value your comrades. Well, I value mine, too. So now my duty would be to fight you."

Luffy's face was serious and grave as he looked at his brother.

"I'm sorry, Ace. He had my hat, and I wasn't thinking."

Ace chuckled grimly as he shook his head.

"I know that your hat is extremely important to you, but dear little brother, you never think at all."

Luffy smiled.

"We're pirates separately seeking One Piece. We would have ended up fighting each other eventually anyway. It doesn't matter whether it's now or later. But right now I hurt your comrades. You have a duty to fight me. It's more serious if we fight this way, right? Otherwise it wouldn't be any different from the fights we had in the village."

Ace's grim smile widened into a grin.

"You're really capable of saying smart things now and again, aren't you? But you're right." His grin disappeared, and he took a fighting stance. "You hurt my comrades. I wouldn't go without fighting you, even with the circumstances involving your hat."

A flicker of doubt that had existed within Ace, opposing to fighting his brother under such serious circumstances, disappeared.

"Good." Luffy's word was accompanied by a serious expression as he, too took a fighting stance.

Without warning, Ace came rushing at Luffy, his arm held out to the side. As he rushed past Luffy, his arm burst into flame, and Luffy only just managed to dodge. Ace's other hand came flying at him, but Luffy had anticipated this, and leapt into the air, nimbly avoiding it. As he flew upward, he kicked out at the other pirate's abdomen. His leg, however, passed right through the man's body.

"Hot!" cried Luffy, nevertheless managing to avoid a column of fire that was shot at his feet.

Ace kicked, punched, and sent out columns of fire, but Luffy succeeded in dodging them all. However, Luffy was not unhurt. He frequently attempted attacks, which accomplished nothing but causing self-inflicted burns.

Ace was quite confident that he could win—he had easily bested his brother before he had eaten the Devil's Fruit, and now, with that advantage, he was sure that his brother had no chance of victory. He did, however, admire his younger brother's determination—he always had. That attitude as though nothing could ever possibly fail, and yet taking defeats without discouragement, but only more determination. He knew that he, too, was like that to an extent, but with Luffy, it seemed to come as naturally as breathing.

Luffy, meanwhile, was not particularly thinking anything. All he knew was that if he was to become Pirate King, he needed to defeat Ace. It did not matter that he had never won before, because then it had just been fights for training and for fun. This time, he had to win in order to fulfill his dream.

Then without warning, something verysmall and unfamiliar entered Luffy's heart. Luffy abruptly stopped moving, surprised. At that very moment, a fist, in the shape of a column of fire, came shooting at his chest. He didn't even try to dodge it. He felt a bursting, burning pain in his chest, and then felt himself flying backwards. The pain, however, was too intense for him to pay much attention to the latter. He thought that he smelled something unpleasant, and then thought that he heard his brother's voice, but the pain was so intense that he could scarcely even tell if it hadn't been his own imagination. As he found himself hitting the water, he felt relieved as the burning stopped. Then, attempting to sigh, he found that he could not breathe or move—he was sinking in the ocean.

The last thing that Luffy felt before everything went black, was puzzlement. What had happened to him?

"I really am fine, doctor-san."

Chopper had been trying continuously to treat Robin's cuts and bruises, but to his frustration, she refused, repeatedly insisting that nothing was wrong, that she was fine.

"But Robin, what if something got infected? And you fell into the water too—the climate here is on the warm side, but not too much so, and that's the perfect climate for a lot of poisonous fish!"

Robin smiled inwardly at the small doctor's determination. Shaking her head in defeat, she gave him a small, kind smile.

"Very well, then, if you insist." Sitting down, she allowed the doctor to rub herbs over her cuts and bruises, also inspecting all exposed skin for bites.

Usually Robin did not refuse treatment, but at the present moment, she was feeling particularly anxious. It had been quite a while since her own fight had ended and Sanji had returned—she had sipped two glasses of cold coffee slowly while she patiently read a book, and then spent approximately ten minutes refusing treatment. Why had the captain and swordsman not yet returned? Was the battle that vigorous? Or had something happened to them? Nami and Usopp occasionally went to the edge of the ship and looked at the docks, but neither could see any sign of movement, nor of Luffy or Zoro. At one point Usopp had said that something, perhaps a fight, appeared to be taking place a little way down the dock, too far to make out clearly, but the movement had abruptly stopped.

Chopper was nervous. He knew that Robin's cuts and bruises were no big deal, and that if she had been fine so far, it was unlikely that she had received any sort of poisonous bite, but he felt the need to do something. He was frightened for Luffy and Zoro, but felt too afraid to go out of the ship on his own to go and look for them. Besides, no one else had mentioned going out and searching for them, and he didn't want to appear to have less faith in the captain and swordsman.

"Hey, a ship's heading this way!" called Usopp. "Only…" his brow furrowed. "It seems to have come around the island from the other side for some reason…"

Chopper rushed to his side to look, the other three following close behind.

Author's Note: I know, about 1000 words shorter than usual in addition to the delayed update. But I promise—the next chapter will be up when I receive five reviews, so review everyone!


	7. Doubt

Author's Note: Those of you seeking action/adventure in this chapter are unlikely to be satisfied. The story's really getting twisted, too—when I started, I only intended this to be a final battle between Luffy and Buggy and their crew, and then have it end when that battle ends. But Buggy died in chapter 5, and it's still going… Well, we'll see where this goes.

Replies to reviews:

imjuzakyd: I'm so sorry; I somehow forgot to reply to your review in the last chapter. I liked your idea, though I sort of twisted it to suit my purposes; Ace's emotional turmoil goes on in this chapter, after the battle. Well, I hope you like what I did with it… Thanks for the complement!

Flagger: Of course, I won't let Luffy die!

babe300: Sorry for twisting it a bit—I tend to do that a lot. I take ideas I like, but then twist them to suit me. I hope I didn't offend you…

B-chan77: Yes, Ace definitely can't kill Luffy, and I refuse to let Luffy die. But come on, do you think that Luffy could even understand the words 'medical assistance'? Besides, that would go completely against his character to back out of a fight, brother or not.

Raifiel: (grins sheepishly) Actually, I'm not too sure myself. But some battles can get pretty wild, so he could get quite far away while he was fighting, I think. I mean, Sanji and Zoro started fighting Mohji and Kabaji at the same time, shortly after that Luffy and Buggy resumed fighting and Alvida and Robin started theirs, and near the end of the last one was the Nami, Usopp and Chopper versus a bunch of Clown Pirates, and none of them on the dock bumped into each other, right? So I guess that Zoro and Luffy ended up going quite far off. So, yeah—it's mostly imagination. Thanks very much for the complements!

Revenge of the Clown

Chapter 7:Doubt

Ace watched, paralyzed with unbelieving eyes as his brother flew through the air towards the ocean, smelling terrible as his rubber skin of his chest burned. That had been a straight column of fire that Luffy could have easily dodged—he had dodged many others of the same attack.

"Luffy!" he cried, breaking out of his trance-like state just before his little brother hit the water. He felt his heart fill with dismay and something else that he had never felt before.

He had never intended to kill Luffy. Defeat him, of course, possibly—and it was very probable—inflicting serious injuries, but never kill him. Rival or not, he was still his little brother. But now that little brother was dying—Luffy had no chance of saving himself because of his Devil's Fruit powers, and Ace could not go to his rescue for the same reason.

For the first time since he had done so, Ace cursed the fact that he had ever eaten a Devil's Fruit. Frantically, he looked around for something or someone that could do something. His eyes fell on his brother's green-haired comrade, lying asleep in the middle of the dock and entirely oblivious to everything around him, and overwhelmed with gratitude at his presence, Ace rushed over to the man and kicked him, being careful that his foot remained solid as he did so.

The green haired man grunted as he woke and glared up at the one who had interrupted his sleep. Upon seeing Ace, he blinked, stared, and then shot up, opening his mouth.

"Luffy fell into the ocean," Ace said as calmly as he could before Zoro could say anything. Zoro's eyes widened and he leapt to his feet, swiftly discarding his swords.

"Where?" Ace pointed, and in a blink of an eye Zoro had dived into the water after his captain.

Ace reprimanded himself for being so nervous as he waited anxiously. His brother's comrades were as loyal to one another as anyone could possibly be, as far as he had seen. The man would not allow his captain to die.

Even so, when Zoro surfaced, supporting Luffy with one arm, Ace still found himself breathing a sigh of relief. It seemed to take much too long for them to reach the dock, where he pulled Luffy up as the other man easily lifted himself up onto the dock.

Luffy's shirt was burnt in the front where Ace's fist had hit. It had opened, revealing a slightly blackened chest as well.

Ace slapped Luffy's cheek in an attempt to wake him. When Luffy did not respond, Ace poked him sharply, being careful to use his nail. The younger boy leapt up with an "ow!" of pain.

Relief swept over Ace's body for a brief moment before the tension returned.

"What _was _that?" Ace found himself scolding his brother. "You could have died! Why didn't you dodge it? You easily could have dodged! That was a straight hit!"

"How did you end up in the ocean anyway?" asked Zoro before Ace could continue. Ace stopped, feeling the unfamiliar emotion consume him once more, and that emotion was too strong and overpowering for him to speak.

Luffy's face creased to a frown, and he slowly sat up. The serious, grave expression on his captain's face made Zoro uneasy. His captain was always lighthearted and entirely sure of himself—Luffy was never grave, even in battle, where he was much more serious than he was at any other time. Luffy had many emotions, and depending on the situation, his personality could vary widely. He was always lighthearted, cheerful and happy on the ship, and serious, determined and sometimes angry—or even furious—in battle. But Zoro, the first of the Straw Hats to join their captain, had never seen Luffy grave, and though he would never admit it, this expression on his captain by itself was capable of frightening Zoro.

"I don't know." The young captain's reply tore Zoro from his thoughts.

"What do you mean you don't know?" asked Zoro, bewildered, annoyed and angry. However, he could not tell whether the annoyance and anger were directed at himself or Luffy. Perhaps it was both.

"He was blasted by one of my attacks," said Ace. Zoro turned to stare at Ace.

"You two were fighting?"

"We hurt Ace's comrades—Ace and I had to fight." The two older men turned around to look at the younger man who was now sitting up. Comprehension dawned in Zoro's eyes.

"Oh yeah—you're one of White Beard's men, aren't you?" The question was directed at Ace, who nodded. "But why did you send him towards the ocean if you didn't want to kill him? And you obviously didn't because you woke me up to save him. You could have just left and none of us would have ever known what had happened to Luffy, and even if we had guessed that he was dead, you would be the last person we'd suspect to be the killer."

Ace looked at the swordsman in annoyance.

"Of course I didn't want to kill him!" Sitting near his brother, Ace shook his head. "That was a blast that Luffy could easily have dodged—he'd dodged a bunch of attacks, ones more difficult than that. But…I don't know, he just…stopped moving and _let _himself get hit by that one."

Zoro stared at Ace. Then he slowly turned to stare at Luffy.

"Luffy?" His captain looked up at him with serious eyes, but did not respond. There was a moment of silence.

A brief, alarming though crossed Zoro's mind, but he pushed it away. Whatever Luffy's problem was, he was not, never had been and never would be suicidal.

"Why didn't you dodge it, Luffy?" This time Ace asked the question. As Ace asked, Zoro retrieved his swords and settled himself near the other two.

Luffy slowly shook his head.

"I don't know." His tone, too, was grave.

For a while, none of them said anything. Luffy gazed at the last of people who had come to watch the fight—the ones who had apparently waited to see if there would be any more—scattering, as it was obvious that it would not continue. Ace watched the people tending to the wounded inhabitants of the island. Zoro stared out to sea.

The silence was long, but not uncomfortable. Each was lost in his own serious thoughts.

"I've never felt that way before."

Luffy was the one to break the silence. As Ace and Zoro turned to look at him, they saw that he had a faraway look in his eyes—one that looked thoughtful.

"It was like…like I shouldn't fight. I mean," Luffy was obviously struggling to explain properly. "I always know that I should fight when I fight. But suddenly, there was this strange feeling…almost like I shouldn't fight, but I still knew that I should fight. But I hurt Ace's comrades, so it felt like I shouldn't fight, because Ace's comrades shouldn't have gotten hurt."

Ace and Zoro's eyes widened. _Doubt_. The word ran through both their minds at once, realizing the same thing in the same moment. Luffy, who was never unsure of anything he did, had felt doubt. Neither knew what to make of it—neither could say a word. Luffy's ability to fight battles without a shred of doubt was one thing that made people admire, and sometimes fear, him. That ability was what had won him many victories and resulted in his being able to defeat foes that seem impossible to defeat.

Ace's brow furrowed. Had he been feeling doubt as well? Had that been the unfamiliar emotion that kept overcoming him? But somehow, that didn't sound right… What he had been feeling was not that he _shouldn't_ do something, but that he _shouldn't have_ done something. No, he realized, he had not been feeling doubt—he had been feeling guilt. He had been feeling guilty for fighting his brother when Luffy could not possibly have done anything else. Another person could be expected to consider his surroundings when fighting, even if he had lost something important, but Luffy simply was not like that. Luffy did not consider his surroundings anyway, and the loss of his hat made it worse—and Ace knew that. None of the men were permanently injured or killed; he could see that now, as they were beginning to stir.

Ace had never done anything that he had regretted before. Even when things seemed to go badly because of something that he had done, though he would curse the fact that he had done something that had not turned out well, he had never felt regret or guilt.

_It's a day of new experiences,_ he thought, smiling inwardly._ Both Luffy and I have felt new things that we've never experienced before._

But would this change Luffy? Would his little brother become someone else, now that he had experienced doubt? The fact that he never felt doubt before had made Luffy what he was. Now that he had, would things change?

Zoro, meanwhile, did not know what to think. He felt surprisingly calm. The initial realization had been a shock, but as he adjusted to it, the shock faded away into nothing. He did not feel dismayed, nervous, anxious, afraid, concerned, relieved… Nothing.

Suddenly Luffy burst out laughing, and as Ace and Zoro looked at him, snapping out of their own thoughts, nothing felt wrong. Luffy's face was back to its usual carelessly cheerful expression.

"Oh well. It was probably because I was hungry. Oh yeah, I didn't have my snack! Or breakfast, and it's already light! I need food. Wait, where's my hat? Buggy gave it back, right? So where is it? I'm so hungry, where's food and my hat?"

Ace's brow furrowed and Zoro glanced around.

"Buggy gave back your hat?" Zoro asked. "But I don't see it anywhere…"

Ace glanced out toward the ocean. "I think… Yeah, Luffy, you had it when you went flying off into the ocean, but not when you came- Hey, look who's here!"

Luffy and Zoro glanced out toward the ocean as well. Zoro's eyes widened.

"Hey, isn't that…"

Luffy was instantly ten times as restless as before.

"The hat! The hat! I'm hungry, where's that hat?" Ace smiled wryly.

"Yes, you do seem to have chosen the worst possible time to lose it, haven't you?"

Zoro glanced from Luffy to the ship that had appeared near the docks, causing all this confusion, and then shrugged. Luffy did not appear to hear anything that Ace said or notice Zoro's movements as he continued to search for his hat, more frantic than ever.

Sanji stared at the ship in horror as it approached. Chopper stared at it in confusion, Robin looked calmer than ever, and Nami and Usopp's expressions revealed mixed emotions.

"Red Haired Shanks," Robin said calmly. "He's one of the strongest pirates existing, and he uses a sword."

"We should run!" Chopper exclaimed. "If he uses a sword, Luffy can't do much!"

"Much as I agree that we should escape, we can't abandon the other two. Besides, Luffy's surprised us all more than once. For all we know, he could do it again."

"We stay."

The two words were spoken firmly by Usopp and Nami in unison. They then turned to stare at one another.

"Why you?" The question, again, was asked in unison.

"My father might be on that ship," Usopp said.

Chopper, Sanji and Nami stared.

"Really?" asked Chopper, awed. Nami and Sanji exchanged a glance.

"Do you think he's lying?" Nami asked Sanji.

"I would say 'yes', but then again, he doesn't particularly look scared…" Sanji replied thoughtfully.

"Hey!" Usopp said indignantly.

"Oh come on, you can't deny what you are," Nami said dismissively. "We know that your father's a pirate, but if he's a member of such a strong pirate ship, why didn't you mention it before now?"

"I wasn't sure, okay?" Usopp's voice was still indignant. "Luffy told me that he was with Red Haired Shanks, and we all know that Luffy isn't that reliable as an information source."

"But how did Luffy know?" Chopper piped up. Usopp shrugged.

"He said that he looked like me."

"Then it probably isn't," Sanji concluded. "Come on, let's go find those two idiots and get out of here. I don't particularly like the idea of being chased by both White Beard _and _Red Hair. One we could handle, I'm sure, but I get a little uneasy thinking about both."

"Oh, is poor Sanji scared?" Usopp mocked, obviously annoyed at his crewmate. Sanji glared.

"Would you like to keep your bones whole?" he asked, lifting his leg threateningly.

Usopp gave a squeak and cowered behind Nami.

"Wait, all of you," the navigator spoke up. "Has anyone here besides myself ever asked Luffy about that hat of his, and why he treasures it so much?" Her question was met with blank stares. She gave a sigh. "Okay, I guess not. Well, there seems to be some connection between Luffy and Red Haired Shanks. The first time that Buggy and Luffy fought, Buggy insulted Luffy's hat and cut it, to which Luffy basically responded that that hat was Shanks, after which Buggy insulted Shanks, which infuriated Luffy."

Usopp and Sanji exchanged a glance, then looked out to the approaching ship. Chopper stared at the ship, apparently fascinated. Robin narrowed her eyes thoughtfully.

"Okay then, Nami-san, if you're sure." The cook leaned against the ship's railing, watching the approaching ship.

"Wait a second…" Usopp spoke up and everyone turned to look at him. "Shouldn't we find Luffy, then? I mean"-he gulped-"apart from Luffy, I'm the only one that has any connection with that ship, but I've never known my father, so anything could happen—even if _Luffy _knows them, chances are that they'll kill us, having no idea that we're his crewmembers."

"We can talk, Usopp," Sanji said, giving the marksman an annoyed glance.

"Besides," Nami added, "Luffy's got quite a bounty on his head now, so chances are that they've seen that and will know us by our mark." Usopp and Sanji frowned thoughtfully.

"Still, navigator-san, we might be better off going to find the captain anyway. If captain-san does know them, he'll want to talk with them, don't you think?"

Everyone looked to Robin in surprise, and then nodded in agreement.

"You cannot _swim_ Luffy! Do _not _jump into the water!"

"I need the hat!"

"I already _searched_ in the water, Luffy! It isn't there!"

"But Ace said that it couldn't be anywhere else!"

The first thing that alerted the five Straw Hats to the location of their captain and swordsman was the arguing voices coming from around a corner. Rounding the corner, they were met with the sight of the green haired swordsman trying to restrain their struggling captain and a third man standing off to the side, watching the ship and paying no attention to the struggling pair beside him.

"Luffy! Zoro!" Chopper called, but his calls apparently met deaf ears as the two continued to argue.

"Ace!" Usopp exclaimed in surprise. "Of course, this is where some of White Beard's people live—I hadn't thought…"

"We don't live here," said Ace, looking away from the ship with a grin. "We just stop here for some time if we need or want to rest. If pirates lived on land, it would be much easier for the marines to catch us."

"Do you know why Red Haired Shanks is here?" Sanji asked curiously.

Ace shrugged, turning his eyes back to the ship, now docking.

"I've been chasing Black Beard for quite a while now, so I'm not as well informed on this sort of stuff, but I've heard rumors that Shanks has been trying to talk with my captain for quite a while now. Of course, captain isn't here…"

The pirates watched as a number of people began to leave the ship.

"Well, I suppose I should go talk to him…" Ace walked off towards the ship.

"Should we go, too?" Usopp asked no one in particular as Ace reached the men and appeared to be talking to them. The people nodded, and one of them turned around and gave a shout towards his ship. Though the Straw Hats were too far away to hear exactly what the man had shouted, he must have called someone, because a second later a man came off from the ship and Ace walked over to him.

Nami, Chopper, Usopp and Sanji stared, glanced at Luffy, and then back to the man that had just come from the ship. Robin raised an eyebrow in surprise. Zoro's grip loosened on his captain, but Luffy did not appear to notice—he had ceased struggling the moment the man had appeared.

"How did _that_ happen?" Nami finally said. No one replied.

The man who had just come out of Red Hair's ship had red hair, but that hair was half hidden by a hat. An old straw hat encircled by a strip of red cloth just above the brim. A hat that looked strangely like the hat that Luffy always wore.

Author's Notes:

So, comments, criticism, complements or ideas, anyone? I'll update when I get five more reviews!


	8. The Red Hair Pirates

Author's Note: I know, it's a short chapter. The thing is, this story's coming to a close, and I thought I'd try and stretch it out if I could… So I guess that this is a bit like an interlude. But whatever it is, I can honestly say that I had quite a bit of fun writing this chapter, even though you readers may not find it that interesting.

Replies to reviews:

Raifiel: I'll go back and see if I can find that mistake. About Luffy doubting—even when Luffy was young, I don't think he's ever doubted himself. He's always done what he does to the fullest. Even when he ate the Gomu Gomu Fruit, he ate it confidently, screamed a bit when he found out what it did, and then was perfectly cheerful again. But yeah, he was a whiner. I noticed that I forgot to answer a question you asked in your last review: Ace isn't intangible—his body can turn into fire at will. So, if taken by surprise, like in Alabasta, he is perfectly solid. If not, the attacker will only hit fire, which you can't really hit. As for chapters, no, I don't have them lying around. I wait until I have the required number of reviews, then write the chapter and post it. It usually doesn't take that long—all that takes time is thinking what the chapter'll be about, and I do that while I wait for the reviews.

vic: Thanks! Here's the update!

babe300: I'm not quite sure what's going to happen to Luffy's hat… No, there won't be any pairings—if you look at my profile, I have an entire paragraph dedicated to One Piece pairings and my beliefs on them (the shortened version. If you want more in detail, tell me and I can email it to you). Not to say that I don't read One Piece stories with pairings. I do, I just don't think that there are enough without pairings that are believable. Ice cream? (grins) That was random. But I'd like ice cream right now… Maybe mint chocolate chip, I like that kind… (drools)

B-chan77: I didn't quite intend that to happen… A reviewer suggested that Shanks appear, and that idea just kind of popped into my head…

purple-lilas: That'll be the next chapter…

Chibified Youkai 101: Thank you! And you don't have to wait that long, I already got five reviews…

Revenge of the Clown

Chapter 8: The Red Hair Pirates

Shanks was a very logical man. He had logic, and could use it in any situation.

That did not, however, mean that he always acted on the logic. He had impulses and whims as well as the logic, and at times he followed the impulses and whims rather than the logic.

This was one of those times. Logic said that he should head further down the Grand Line where he would meet White Beard, with whom he wanted to speak. Impulse, however, said that he should go the other way—back the way they had come.

So, despite clear logic and an entire ship of crewmembers that said otherwise, he decided to head backwards up the Grand Line. Everyday at sea, the men complained and protested, but Shanks never had a doubt. He felt that there was some reason that he should be going the way that they were going—despite the fact that they had no particular indicator to follow.

So they spent many days at sea, the other men becoming more and more restless as less and less people could even guess where the ship was any more. Shanks, however, did not care. Many of his higher-ranking men shook their heads in exasperation, but Shanks did not even appear to notice.

"Shanks…"

After a week of tossing about on the ocean with absolutely no idea of where they were or which way to go apart from Shanks' apparent impulses, the first mate made up his mind to speak with the captain.

Hearing his name called, Shanks turned, grinning when he saw the man climbing to meet him on the observation deck. Being the captain, Shanks could have let himself out of doing observation duty, but he stuck with it. This was one of his many characteristics which inspired his men's loyalty and faith in their captain. Shanks did jobs with his men. He did not simply sit around and order, apart from the occasional exception, and was very approachable. He did not act above the other men on the ship.

"Something the matter, Ben?" Shanks asked, seeing the serious expression on the other man's face.

Ben did not answer. He sat himself beside the captain and looked out at the sea for a while. Shanks looked at him expectantly for some time, then looked back at the sea.

"What are you following, captain?" Ben finally asked. Shanks looked at his first mate with an amused expression.

"It took you a week to ask me that question? I thought that someone would have asked me before now." Ben smiled and shrugged.

"You have so many whims that we don't question them at first anymore. We'd waste quite a bit of time if we kept doing that. If they continue for a while, then we start getting curious." Shanks raised an eyebrow.

"I see that you people have been talking behind my back. So this 'for a while' translates to 'for a week'?" Ben laughed.

"It's no agreement, captain—at least not a spoken one. It's just something that everyone picks up after being around you for a while."

Shanks grinned and turned back to the ocean.

"Impulse."

Ben stared.

"Excuse me?"

"You asked me what I was following. I'm following impulse."

"And here I thought you were trying to avoid answering my question."

"I never avoid questions." Ben raised an eyebrow and stared steadily at the red-haired man beside him. "Well, not ones that I can answer. You should know that."

"And I'm supposed to know whether or not it's a question that you can answer _before_ I ask you?"

Shanks glared at Ben before turning back to the ocean once more. "I never said that."

"No," Ben agreed as he lit a cigar, "you implied it."

"So, why did you want to know?"

"Pardon?"

"Why did you want to know what I was following? I thought you'd already know." Ben rolled his eyes.

"Of course I know that you're following impulse. Every single man on this ship knows that. I meant, to where are your impulses leading us this time?"

"How am I supposed to know?"

"They're your impulses, and you're leading us."

"Well-"

Suddenly stopping, Shanks stared out at the ocean, his eyes narrowing. Then he abruptly stood, leaning over the side of the observation deck.

"Put the helm to thirty degrees starboard!" he shouted. He caught a few annoyed looks shot his way from men who thought he couldn't see them, and pretended not to notice. After making sure that his men had done exactly as he had ordered, he sat back down beside Ben.

"Like I said, where I we headed?"

"I just told you, I don't know!"

"No, you asked me how you were supposed to know."

"To most people, that means 'I don't know'."

"Those people are naïve. Anyone can twist your words to their own liking using phrases like that. It really is quite annoying when people take those phrases literally, you know."

"And you're not doing that now?"

"See, you're doing it again."

"Ben…" Ben shrugged.

"You started it!"

"I did not."

"Yes you did!"

"I refuse to participate in such a childish banter."

"You started it!"

To anyone who didn't know the long-haired first mate, it would look as if Ben was annoyed and wishing to be as far away from the captain as possible. Anyone who did know Ben, however, could easily see that the man was thoroughly enjoying himself.

"Really, where _are _you heading?" As Ben asked the question, the serious expression returned to his face.

"I really don't know."

Ben smiled wryly and shook his head, leaning back with his arms crossed.

"Just as long as you don't bring us into some storm, whirlpool, or any other sort of disaster."

The two sat in companionable silence for a while, gazing out to the sea.

"We don't banter that much any more," Shanks murmured quietly. "Today's banter was the first since we started heading for wherever it is that we're going."

"Our group's much larger now, captain," Ben said with a smile. "I doubt that even half of us would fit in one of those village bars that we used to go to anymore. We have to show more responsibility."

"I know that. I was just commenting. And you don't call me Shanks anymore either. It's always 'captain' nowadays."

"Really? I never noticed."

"You don't have to be sarcastic. I was just commenting."

"I know."

"They always have consequences." Ben stared at his captain.

"Shanks, if you keep changing the topic at this rate without even telling me what topic you're changing to, I'll be off this deck quite soon."

"I was just commenting."

"Yes, I could tell. I just don't have any idea what in the world you were commenting _on_."

"My whims, of course."

"There's no 'of course' about it! We were talking about a completely different topic!"

"But this is the topic we started on, and the one that you came up here to talk about."

"That doesn't mean that I can just pinpoint the topic that you decided to jump to without a doubt."

"So you could do it, but you would doubt yourself."

"Yes, because what you just said is, in other words, known as guessing."

"No, because guessing could be wrong. What you just said is that you would be right, but you would doubt it."

"No one said a single thing about being right until you did."

"You said 'pinpoint the topic'. That implies that you're right."

"What are they?"

"You mean you don't remember any at all?"

Ben sighed.

"I remember, I just thought that I could catch you off guard and give you a little dose of your own medicine." Shanks smirked before replying.

"I have a quicker mind than you do." Ben raised an eyebrow at him

"Really? I doubt that."

"I just proved it. When I change the topic unexpectedly, you can't keep up. When you change the topic unexpectedly, I can." Ben opened his mouth to reply, but Shanks added more before his first mate could speak. "And don't change the topic now—that wouldn't count, because it would be expected." Ben sighed and rolled his eyes.

"Maybe you just know me too well."

"That I do. And you should know me just as well as I know you."

"I do—you just have a more unpredictable personality."

"Do you trust my whims?" Ben shrugged.

"They always seem come out well, but they also always seem to have consequences."

"The worst consequence," added Ben with a sharp look at Shanks, "being the loss of your arm." Shanks frowned at Ben.

"Really, Ben—if I'd gone with everyone else into the mountains, Luffy would be dead. If I _hadn't_ followed that whim, I don't think I ever could have forgiven myself."

"None of us ever could have. That was the closest the kid ever came to dying."

Shanks gave a chuckle.

"Not anymore. With a bounty like his, I suspect that he's had a number of close brushes with death." Ben smiled.

"That's true."

Their eyes were back on the sea, and this time the silence lasted for a long time.

They watched waves rise wildly as the ship disturbed the waters, then slap against the ship's edge, scattering into white foam before even hitting the ship, it seemed. They watched the waters surrounding the ship, with small, calm waves dancing serenely about. They would look when the occasional fish or dolphin jump from the ocean's water, plunging back in momentarily. They looked at the horizon, an almost undetectable line between the deep blue water and the clear blue sky.

"When do you think we'll see him?" Ben asked the question in a whisper, almost as if he didn't intend Shanks to hear. The captain answered anyway.

"At the rate that he's going, I should think quite soon." Ben smiled.

"Do you think he will pass us?" He looked to his captain as he asked the question, and was surprised to see a wide grin spreading on the man's face.

"We'll see."

Ben grinned as he turned back to the ocean. Despite his captain's cryptic answer, he was sure that his captain felt, as he did, that before long Luffy would have passed them, just as he had said he would do as a small, determined, seven year old child.

The two men went back to looking at the ocean. They did not talk after that, but simply watched their surroundings.

Days passed, and every crewmember was becoming increasingly annoyed with the captain. The exceptions were perhaps only Ben, who was growing increasingly amused, and Shanks, who seemed to be oblivious to everything.

But on the day exactly two weeks after Shanks and Ben had their conversation on the observation deck, something happened.

"Land! Captain, there is land up ahead!" The shout came from the man on the observation deck. Everyone at least paused what they were doing to look up, if only briefly, and some rushed to the edge of the ship to get a better look.

"Can you tell what island it is?" The shout to the man on the observation deck came from Lucky Roo. The man hesitated for a few minutes before replying.

"I think…yes, I'm quite sure…I think that it must be White Island."

At this, many turned to stare at the captain.

"Why did you bring us here, captain?" one man asked. "Some of White Beard's men stay here, but never White Beard himself, much less anyone else important…"

Shanks shrugged in reply, a grin appearing on his face.

"We'll soon find out, won't we?"


	9. Time

Replies to reviews:

babe300: No, I don't have MSN, but my email address is if you'd like to email me. It would be great if you could!

B-chan77: Here you are, but I warn you—it may be disappointing.

tokie44: Thanks!

Digitaldreamer: You're right—when (if) Luffy gets his hat back, that's going to be the end of this story. But about the falling action: I think this story doesn't really have that kind of structure. I think that it's more of two stories—the Buggy part and then the Shanks part. Each of them brings different problems that have to be resolved. And all surrounding that hat. Thanks! Yes, I don't see that many Shanks and Ben fics… (grins) I know—you're a ZoLu person. I've read pretty much all your fics (though I've never reviewed, I think—how hypocritical of me. I'll get to it one of these days…), since ZoLu is one of the pairings that I read. I believe that romance is completely improbable on that ship (I believe that they all share a bond stronger than a romantic one, maybe even stronger than family), but I read certain pairings anyway…

VM: Here's the update! (Though naturally, if you're reading this you already know that.)

Revenge of the Clown

Chapter 9:Time

The Straw Hat crew stood motionless, staring at the man as he spoke with Ace. After only a brief conversation, however, the man who they had now identified as Shanks turned to look their way. For a moment, the captain of the Red Hair Pirates and the entire crew of the Straw Hat Pirates simply stood staring at one another. Then Shanks grinned at them.

As though a spell had been broken, the Straw Hat Pirates instantly began to move again. Usopp shot behind Sanji, gripping the cook's black jacket and mumbling pleas for protection. Sanji tried to shake him off. Chopper shot behind Robin's legs, attempting to hide himself. Robin shot a worried glance the navigator's way. Nami backed up a few steps, suddenly sure that she had been wrong after all, and they were now facing an extremely strong pirate who would defeat all of them. Zoro glanced at Luffy in surprise as the captain stiffened.

Shanks began walking toward them, and Ace turned away to the man treating the injured men on the dock. He had neglected his duty of seeing that his men were all right so far, and it was time that he started attending to that duty.

"You know, now that I think about it," Usopp said shakily with a gulp, "I think that we should just turn around. I must have been wrong after all."

No one replied. They remained completely still once more. The only sounds were that of the people talking in the surrounding areas, and that of Shanks's approaching footsteps. When he was only ten meters away, however, Luffy's face abruptly broke into a wide grin.

"Shanks! What're you doing here?"

He pulled away from the swordsman's loosened grip and took a few steps toward the older man. Luffy's grin, however, was not enough to break the tension, which was still so thick that it seemed as though the air could be cut with a knife. Shanks appeared to notice this as he stopped in front of Luffy. The grin on his face widened.

"Still as thoughtless as ever, I see. Really, Luffy, I thought that you'd drowned when I saw my hat floating around in the ocean."

Luffy burst out laughing. Zoro, Nami, Sanji and Robin gave small smiles, Usopp heaved a sigh of relief, releasing Sanji, and Chopper cocked his head in confusion, but stepped out from behind Robin. The tension had gone in an instant.

"Shanks, this is Zoro, he's a swordsman and uses three swords, Nami's our smart navigator, Usopp's the marksman, Sanji's the cook, Chopper's the doctor, and Robin is an archaeologist—she's a genius!"

Shanks raised an eyebrow.

"Well, I have to say that I recognize quite a few of you—Zoro, you're the pirate hunter, aren't you? And Nami—I seem to recall someone of your description being called the pirate-specializing thief in East Blue."

"Yup. They were my first two comrades." Shanks raised an eyebrow at this, and looked at the two being discussed.

"Well… Both of you were against pirates, and yet you decided to follow a pirate?"

"I was forced," said Zoro without missing a beat. Everyone stared at the swordsman. Then, slowly, Nami, Usopp and Sanji turned to stare at Luffy.

"You _forced_ Zoro to come along?" asked Usopp.

"And he actually _listened_ to you?" added Sanji.

"Why have we never heard about this?" asked Nami incredulously.

"There seems to be a severe lack of discussion among you, doesn't there?" commented Robin calmly.

"I was forced to choose between death or Luffy. I was tied against a pole, Luffy would only untie me if I agreed to join me, and we had a bunch of marines charging at us. And there wasn't anything to discuss," he added to Robin coldly, "because I don't regret joining Luffy in the least."

Nami shook her head.

"And I thought that I had it worst when it came to Luffy's persuasion…" she commented dryly.

"Why, what did he do to you?" Shanks inquired with an amused expression.

"He and Zoro decided that I was their navigator before I even agreed."

"Ha!" snorted Usopp. "That wasn't bad at all! He came onto the ship where I was captain, kicked all my men off my ship, and named himself captain!"

"Really, Usopp, you could at least stop your lies when we're in the presence of extremely powerful pirates." Nami spoke her words with an annoyed frown. Zoro snorted.

"You, Usopp, were the only one of us with whom there was no issue joining us. He threatened my life, needed a fight to persuade Nami, spent _days_ on end trying to get Love Cook over there, spent an entire day chasing Chopper all over the castle, and Robin…" Zoro shook his head. Usopp crossed his arms with an angry snort.

"That's only because there hasn't been a single person who Luffy wanted that hasn't joined him!" Nami opened her mouth to protest, but seemed to change her mind as the cook spoke up.

"He tried to strangle me, you know," added Sanji.

Shanks burst into uncontrollable laughter.

"I always knew that this kid would do well," he laughed. From behind him, a large man with long black hair pulled back into a ponytail walked up to them. He glanced over the people standing in front of Shanks.

"Captain, wha-" Then his eyes fell on Luffy, and his eyebrows shot up. "Luffy!"

"Sub-captain!" Luffy's grin widened even more, and then his eyes fell on the people approaching behind the captain and sub-captain, and his grin widened further.

"Roo! Yasopp! Everyone!" Usopp's eyes widened, and he stared at the approaching men. Indeed, among them was a man with the same curly hair, and the same face as himself, though with a much shorter nose.

"'Yasopp'?" he muttered in a small voice. Though the other man was much too far away to hear, he stopped in his tracks as though he had. The smile that he had been about to give Luffy vanished, and his eyes swept across the others to fall on Usopp. He froze.

"Dad?" Usopp's voice was just loud enough for the older man to hear this time. The man's eyes widened.

"Usopp!" without missing a beat, the man rushed over to embrace his son.

Luffy grinned, and beside him Shanks and Ben smiled.

"I thought it must be—he looks so much like Yasopp," said Shanks, as Ben beckoned to the astonished Straw Hats to move away, giving the reunited father and son a little privacy.

"So you did know what you were talking about," said Sanji, looking at Luffy with a surprised expression.

Luffy turned to glare at the cook and stomped his foot indignantly.

"Of course I know what I'm talking about! That was rude!" Sanji snorted, but did not reply.

"Oh, Luffy's never known what he was talking about," said Shanks lightly. The unified snort of agreement from Nami, Sanji and Zoro caused another grin to break out on the man's face.

"So, a pirate hunter, Zeff's boy, Yasopp's son, Nico Robin, a raccoon and a girl who I don't recognize," commented Lucky Roo. "You have done quite exceptionally so far, haven't you, Luffy?"

"I'm a reindeer!" said Chopper indignantly.

"Oh, he's Zeff's boy? Now that you mention it, I can see it. You may not recognize the girl by face, but remember that pirate-specializing thief we heard about from East Blue?" Sanji's brow furrowed, but Lucky Roo replied before he had a chance to speak.

"Oh, that's her? Then you've done exceptionally, Luffy, though I'd dearly like to know how you got two members whose previous professions set them strongly against pirates." Sanji considered whether to cut off the conversation, but Shanks spoke before he could even open his mouth.

"They were his first members," Shanks told the others with a grin. "He threatened Zoro and apparently persuaded the girl with a fight."

Making up his mind to ask, Sanji opened his mouth. Suddenly, Luffy's eyebrows shot up as he remembered something, and his question cut Sanji off once more.

"Shanks?" he addressed his idol. "You knew Buggy the Clown, didn't you?" Shanks shrugged.

"I suppose, in a way. Why?"

"Because I just killed him." Shanks looked around at the voice, grinning at Ace in greeting as he approached.

"It doesn't particularly bother me, if that's what you're asking, Luffy. I never really considered him a friend."

"Okay, then."

"How do you know me and Zeff?" Finally finding an opening, Sanji seized it, forgetting to even insult the old ex-pirate. Shanks looked at Sanji and raised his eyebrows.

"You don't remember? Well, you were quite young… Just after Baratie was set up, my men and I visited it briefly. I used to know Zeff, you see."

If Sanji was surprised, he hid it well.

Shanks smiled and pulled the black cloak that he always wore closer to his body with his right hand as a gust of wind swept past, threatening to pull back the cloak and expose his left arm. Nami raised an eyebrow at this.

"Is there something wrong with your left arm? You keep it covered with the cloak, and it doesn't even seem to move…" Shanks eyebrows shot upwards at the orange-haired navigator's inquiry.

"You know, you people really do seem to suffer from lack of communication. Luffy never said anything about it?" Zoro, Nami, Sanji and Chopper all shook their heads in unison. Robin glanced at the captain and raised an eyebrow.

"Navigator-san was the only one who knew that you and captain-san even knew each other. Long-nose-kun seems to have suspected, but seemed quite unsure."

"Which reminds me, where _is_ Luffy?" asked Nami, looking around.

"Over there," Zoro replied instantly, nodding toward the Red Hair Pirates' ship. Luffy was talking and laughing with a number of crewmembers, appearing very much at home.

"Luffy!" called Shanks. Luffy looked around questioningly. "I'm surprised at you! I would have thought that you'd be a bit more grateful!" There was a teasing note in the man's voice, and Luffy rocketed himself back to Shanks and his crewmembers with a grin. "They just asked me about my left arm, and it appears that only your navigator and Yasopp's boy knew that you knew I existed!"

Luffy looked at Shanks, and then glanced at his comrades in surprise.

"You guys never asked," he said, apparently feeling that that was a good explanation.

"People don't go around asking other people, 'hey, do you happen to know Red-Haired Shanks by any chance?' on a regular basis," said Sanji, lighting a cigarette.

"He saved me," Luffy shrugged. "But the thing got his arm." His comrades, with the exception of Usopp, who was not there, and Robin, who was calm as usual, stared at him incredulously. Luffy stared back with wide, innocent eyes.

"Is that the best explanation we're going to get?" asked Zoro.

"Knowing Luffy, yes," replied Shanks without missing a beat.

"That was rude!" Luffy huffed, crossing his arms indignantly.

As they day went on, the Straw Hats continued to talk with Shanks. They became acquainted with Shanks, Ben, Yasopp, Lucky Roo, and other men who Luffy introduced them to. What little tension had remained after their initial conversation with Shanks disappeared soon afterwards, and soon they were all chatting like the oldest of friends.

Ben, however, noticed that something was not right. While everyone appeared to be having a good time, he could see a faint tension slowly building in his captain. Luffy, too, appeared slightly uneasy as the day went by. Though no one else appeared to notice, he knew the cause for this tension.

Things had not begun right. Luffy should have handed the hat over to Shanks directly, yet Shanks had found it floating in the ocean, fished it out, and then found Luffy on the dock with his comrades and brother. There should have been a serious conversation between the two, or at least some significant words passing between them.

Yet, because of their untimely arrival, none of this had happened. Not only that, but Luffy and Shanks were constantly surrounded by people, and could not bring up a topic of conversation that was private between the two of them alone.

The day was wearing on—it was already midafternoon. They would have to leave before dark. The Logue of this island took exactly half a day to collect. Right now, if they did not allow the Logue of this island to collect and followed their Logue Pose, they would get back to the island from where they had started. If the Logue of this island should collect, they would have to follow the chain of islands back again, which was very inconvenient.

This, however, meant that Luffy and Shanks would have to talk before that. Yet, it seemed as though that was not likely to happen. Whenever one topic of conversation became even a little boring, someone else always came up with something else. There was a feast, there was drinking… It showed no signs of ending any time soon.

Ben looked around at the members of Luffy's crew. The pirate-specializing thief was drinking; Yasopp's boy was talking enthusiastically to a crowd of people; Zeff's boy was flirting with every female in sight; the raccoon—or was it a reindeer?—was eating as though the food would disappear; Nico Robin sipped a drink as she read some books brought out by some Red Hair Pirates. Shanks appeared to be drinking, but while he usually consumed ridiculous amounts of alcohol, he did not appear to be consuming that much today; Luffy was eating, but though according to his crewmembers he ate to the extent that he would become as round as a balloon, he did not appear to be eating all that much, though still more than the average person could consume in one go. They both were talking with a large crowd of people about their adventures, but gradually, the two spoke less and less.

The pirate hunter, Rononoa Zoro, had been drinking until a short while ago, but now he sat leaning against the wall, watching with narrowed eyes. Ben approached him.

"Something's wrong with Luffy," Zoro said when Ben leaned against the wall beside him. Though he did not look up, and his mouth barely moved as he spoke, Ben knew at once that he was the one being addressed.

"I know. My captain as well," said Ben. He turned to look at Zoro seriously. "They need to talk. This meeting didn't go the way it should have at all."

"Luffy should have handed Shanks his hat on his own. They should have talked over what's happening together, not when surrounded by a huge crowd." Ben nodded. The swordsman understood.

"Don't the rest of your crew notice?" Ben asked. Zoro smiled wryly.

"Of course they do. Except for Usopp and Love Cook. They're too busy with their own things. But Nami lost two drinking contests, Chopper keeps dropping things, and Robin keeps glancing up from her book. They just don't know what's wrong, and they know better than to ask about it." Ben raised an eyebrow.

"Then how do you know what's wrong?" Zoro's eyes narrowed slightly as he watched his captain.

"I made a promise to a friend once, too. I know how I would have felt if I had fulfilled that promise, but was surrounded by so many people that I couldn't talk to her after that. It's not that much different from this. How did you know? None of the men in your ship seem to notice." Ben smiled.

"I know captain better than they do. He's an unpredictable man, so he's very hard to read."

"What do you plan to do about this?"

"That's what I wanted to ask you."

Zoro glanced at Ben and shrugged. With the number of people that Luffy and Shanks were talking to and time rapidly running out, the whole thing seemed thoroughly hopeless.

Author's Note:

Okay, that was hard to write. Nothing really happens, so it seemed extremely difficult. Especially the first half, you can just see my struggle. (snorts in self-disgust) But I like how the second half came out. So, I'm pretty sure that the next chapter will be the last. And since it's going to be the last chapter, I'd like to have _more_ than six reviews before I update. You're welcome to criticize, go ahead; just review!


	10. The Straw Hat Pirates

Author's Note: Here's the final chapter. I considered adding an epilogue, but that just wouldn't fit. I like the way this chapter ends, and I think that that's the way the story should end.

You people are so _quick_ when I ask for a certain number of reviews! I up the number of required reviews, wondering if I'll get that many, I wake up in the morning to check, and there're exactly the number I asked for! (shakes head in disbelief) I should have said 'ten' instead of 'six'… I wonder what would have happened?

Replies to reviews:

Digitaldreamer: Well, Luffy talks to Shanks, but it may not quite be what you expect… I hope you like it, though. About Luffy and Zoro: yeah, I think that the two of them share a certain bond that's a little stronger than the others. I can't quite say why, but their interaction in the books just seems that way. And the two of them and Nami. Those three seem more…well…kind of open to each other than the others… I can't quite explain it, but I think you get what I'm trying to say.

xXSanji-kunXx: (grins) Glad to hear from you! I didn't quite think you'd forgotten, but I wondered where you were. About that guy's name: (shrugs) I really wouldn't know. I read the things in Japanese, so a lot of the spellings are off in English. Like the guy who fights Zoro in Buggy's crew, for example. I found out recently that his name is not spelled 'Kabaji' but 'Cabaji'. But people understand who they are anyway, and I'm too lazy to go back and fix everything.

babe300: Okay, the final chapter… Tell me what you think of it!

tokie44: Thanks! Luffy will get to talk to Shanks (I couldn't possibly have them part without talking properly), but the rest may be unexpected, or even out of character.

Raifiel: Actually, Luffy doesn't really know Zoro's, Nami's, Chopper's, or Robin's. Luffy isn't really the kind of person to talk about that kind of thing—he only lives in the present, I think, and doesn't care in the least about the past. About Zoro: true, but I wanted to show some sort of connection between Ben and Zoro, because they're the ones that know their captains best. I did consider having Zoro shrug and then writing how he knew because of his own promise in his thoughts, but I thought that it worked a little better if he spoke briefly to Ben… But yeah, it's out of character.

B-chan77: (grins) You may be surprised: things are going to go quite differently.

Revenge of the Clown

Chapter 10:The Straw Hat Pirates

"Well, it has definitely been an eventful day," sighed Nami tiredly, propping her head up on her arms as she stood on the edge of the deck at the back of the ship.

Usopp looked around at her from where he sat on the railing beside her. "That's quite an understatement."

For some time, there was silence. Then Chopper spoke, watching the ocean behind them between two railings.

"Did we do the right thing?"

"Of course we did," snapped Zoro, his eyes snapping open to glare at Chopper. He was sitting with his back against the wall that was back of the kitchen, his hands behind his head as he attempted to sleep. "None of us would have done it if we weren't sure that it was absolutely the right thing to do!"

"I think I'll go make us something to eat," Sanji murmured, almost inaudibly, as he walked around the wall against which Zoro was leaning, heading for the kitchen door on the other side.

"Are you sure about that, swordsman-san?" asked Robin quietly as she watched the island slowly shrinking in the distance with the others. "All of us are out of sorts—Long-Nose-kun, cook-san and doctor-san are all quiet and reserved, navigator-san is only trying to bring things back to normal, and your temper is ready to explode at any moment."

"It doesn't matter, Robin," Nami cut in quietly, her face falling. "This decision wasn't made for our own good."

"You're right, Robin," snapped Zoro. "The world is coming to an end—Nami's doing things that aren't selfish." Nami spun around to glare at him.

"_You _were against this whole idea! That makes you entirely selfish, not me!"

Sanji came back around the corner.

"Nami-san, I heard your angered voice and-" He suddenly noticed the death glares that she and Zoro were shooting each other. "Aegagropila, how dare you insult a lady!"

"You just go back to your kitchen," Zoro snapped at the cook. "I don't want to deal with you right now." Sanji snorted.

"Well, for your information, neither do I! So you can just jump of the side of the ship," Sanji snapped in retort. Then, to everyone's surprise, he headed back to the kitchen without another word.

Usopp shook his head.

"This is just wrong. Maybe we should head back, and-"

"It's too late, Long-Nose-kun," Robin said, nodding to the island behind them. "If you look closely, you can see that the Red-Hair Pirates are already leaving the island."

They all gazed at the tiny ship visible in the distance as it left the island, every one of them doubting their decision.

__

"Our Logue's collected," Nami announced to the Straw Hat Pirates as they stood on the dock right in front of the Red Hair Pirates' ship. "That means that their Logue will be collecting soon, so they're going to have to leave."

"We know that, Nami," Usopp told her, but Nami was not listening.

"Where's Luffy?" she asked.

The others looked around as well, and to their surprise, the captain and the swordsman were missing from the group. Though Luffy was nowhere in sight, Zoro was approaching, coming from the Red Hair's ship.

"Where were you, lost?" taunted Sanji. "And where's Luffy?" Zoro ignored the insult for once as he joined the group of his crewmates.

"No, I was talking with Ben. Luffy and Shanks are finally talking." Nami and Chopper heaved a sigh of relief, and a small smile appeared on Robin's lips. Usopp and Sanji exchanged a puzzled glance.

"What do you mean, 'finally'?" asked Usopp.

"Yes, Nami-san," agreed Sanji, "they spent all day talking." Nami shot the two of them an annoyed glare.

"They needed to talk just to each other, not with an entire crowd," said Robin. Zoro raised an eyebrow. So Robin had known what was wrong after all. He heard Chopper give a quiet 'ohh' a sound from Nami's direction that sounded suspiciously like a stifled gasp, and knew that he was nevertheless right about the other two—they had not known what was wrong. Sanji swooned with an "of course, Robin-chan always knows everything!", and Usopp raised his eyebrows in response to the archaeologist's words.

"But Robin, Zoro just came from the deck of the Red Hair Pirates' ship—if they needed to have a private conversation, the deck of a ship, especially that one, would be the least likely place," Usopp reasoned.

"Do you dare insult Robin-chan's logic?" Sanji demanded threateningly. Everyone else ignored him.

"It's not exactly a private conversation that they need to have, Usopp," Nami spoke up.

"But she just said, they needed to talk alone!" Usopp said before Nami could say any more.

"They do," Nami told him impatiently.

"It's not a private conversation, Long-Nose-kun," Robin explained. "It doesn't matter who hears. It just matters that it's only the two of them talking."

"Yeah, come on, Luffy!" came a voice from behind them. They all looked around to see a few people gathering around Luffy and Shanks, who were sitting on the railing of the ship.

"It'll be fun! You always wanted to join us when you were little!"

All the Straw Hats felt a unified jolt in their chests as they realized what the Red Hair Pirates were saying to Luffy: they were inviting him to join them. They had heard from a number of people all the things that Luffy used to do to try and join Shanks, the worst of which was stabbing himself deeply in the face below his left eye.

When the shouts from Shanks' men died down enough for Luffy to reply, the Straw Hats waited with their hearts in their mouths as they waited for his reply.

After a moment, they saw Luffy shake his head and speak to the men, though not loud enough that they could hear. Even so, the Straw Hats' hearts sank as one.

Luffy had hesitated. There was still a part of him that wanted to join them, but he could not: they were in the way.

It was as though their hearts had connected. The realization came to all of them in unison, and each knew that all the others had felt it, too. They stood in silence as the men scattered, some appearing disappointed.

"We should go," Nami said quietly. "Before he comes back down. He'd never let us go through with it—he'd never leave us of his own will." Sanji nodded mutely in agreement.

"But…but…" Usopp stuttered, looking heart-brokenly up at their captain. If they followed through with Nami's idea, he would become captain, he realized—he had appointed himself for that position when they first got the ship, and had been met with no resistance. But now that the opportunity stood before him, he realized that he did not want it. He looked up to and depended heavily on their captain. Then he looked around at his companions: Nami's eyes were cast downwards in a resigned way; Sanji looked up at Luffy wistfully; Chopper looked like he was fighting back tears; Robin, the usually emotionless woman, had a far-off look in her eyes, which were glazed with sadness. Zoro, however, was glaring at the rest angrily.

"No," Zoro said. "Luffy gave us all choices when joining him"-identical snorts came from Sanji and Nami-"and we owe it to him to let him make his own choices. What if that wasn't hesitation after all? He'd be heart-broken to know that we left him behind!"

"I don't think that Luffy's heart is capable of breaking, Zoro," said Usopp, looking like he was fighting back a laugh.

Zoro closed his lips tightly and glared at the marksman. I didn't think that Luffy was capable of doubting himself before today either, he thought, but did not have the heart to say it out loud.

He saw that all but himself were sure of this decision, and could not bring himself to protest any further. For all he knew, Nami was right and Luffy wanted to stay with Shanks, but was held back only by his comrades.

"Do you think that Luffy will miss us?" Chopper asked as they walked back to the ship.

Everyone heard the question, and each remembered Luffy persuading them to join him.

"Yes, Chopper," Zoro began to reply.

"I think he will," Nami finished.

Sanji returned with something to eat. Taking it from him, they watched the other ship in silence. Would they hold together without their captain? They had bonds amongst themselves, there was no doubt about that. Luffy, however, had been their heart.

Robin recalled the seventeen-year-old hoisting her over his shoulder and carrying her out of the collapsing underground chamber, despite her protests that she wished to die. He had then allowed her on his ship without a single word of protest, despite all that she had done.

Chopper remembered the other 'monster' who had been the first to call him a nakama. Luffy had liked him for his peculiarities—not despite them. He remembered running all over the castle until night fell as Luffy chased him around, telling him to join him.

Sanji felt a faint smile appear on his face as he remembered the odd-job boy practically strangling him in an attempt to convince him to come along, and then when ordered by Zeff to take Sanji along, promptly refusing to do so without Sanji's consent.

Usopp remembered the pirate agreeing to help him save his village without a second thought, then on the way to the battle, losing his way and yelling angrily at Usopp for failing to tell him which way was north when he finally reached the battlefield in the nick of time.

Nami remembered the comrade who had never doubted her, even when she betrayed him. She had heard from Nojiko that he had flat out refused to hear the story of the island and why she did what she did. Yet, no matter what she did, he was always nearby, waiting for her. When she had reached the end of her self control, Luffy had been right there, stopping the knife with which she was stabbing her shoulder, and wholly ready to fight for her, despite not knowing the story behind everything—just because Arlong had made her cry.

At the thought of continuing without their captain, Zoro suddenly felt his heart drop to the pit of his stomach. Luffy had given him the most confidence in his dream. He had promised Luffy that as his comrade, he would become the best swordsman in the world. Luffy had been the one who had restrained himself and the others from interfering with his battle with Mihawk. Luffy had told him that only the strongest swordsman in the world could be worthy to be a comrade of the future Pirate King…

Zoro jolted upright, turning frantically to the others.

"We've got to head back!" he exclaimed. Chopper, Usopp, and Robin stared at him, but Sanji and Nami's eyes widened as the same realization struck them as well.

"Usopp, come on, we've got to get the helm!" Sanji called. Usopp's eyes widened as he looked at the varying expressions of his crewmates, puzzled and alarmed.

"Wait, wha-?"

"Hurry up, Sanji-kun, Usopp!" snapped Nami, and with a squeak on Usopp's part, the two rushed for the kitchen.

CRASH!

Promptly, something came hurtling through the air in a blur of colors and crashed into the wall that was the back of the kitchen, opening a large hole there. Nami, Zoro, Chopper and Robin stared at the pile of splintered wood through the hole, and Sanji and Usopp, appearing at the kitchen door, stared in shock at the unexpected sight that met their eyes.

Something red pushed itself up from under the pile of splintered wood, and when they had only barely registered that it was a human, turned to glare accusingly through the large hole at the four standing on the other side of what was previously a wall.

"You left me behind!" the figure said indignantly, crossing his arms with a huff. "As captain of this ship, I have to say that I am extremely displeased with the way people can't even seem to remember each other around here. Honestly, guys!"

Sanji's mouth was wide open, and his cigarette fell out of his mouth. Usopp and Chopper stared, Nami's face was full with every emotion imaginable, Zoro glared with a "took you long enough", and Robin raised a hand to hide the wide smile that was spreading across her face.

Then, the shock passing under the unwavering accusing glare of their captain, the four in front of him broke into wide, unhidden smiles. For a few moments, Luffy continued to glare, but then with a loud laugh, all anger seemed to vanish from him in an instant, and the two behind him relaxed as well.

"We should have known," murmured Nami, her smile more relieved than anything.

"Of course. What kind of crew forgets their captain's dream?" Zoro commented quietly.

"The kind known as the Straw Hat Pirates, apparently," Robin replied with a grin. Zoro responded with a glare.

"That was a rhetorical question," the swordsman told the archaeologist.

Their captain, however, appeared entirely oblivious to this exchange, for he was doing the same thing that he had done twice that day already—the thing that had caused all the trouble in the first place.

"My hat, where's my hat?" he cried as he dug through the pile of rubble where he had crash-landed.

Chopper and Usopp exchanged a worried glance before joining him in his search. Zoro rolled his eyes in exasperation with the thought, and here we go again. Sanji looked at Luffy through eyes narrowed with annoyance. Nami let out an exhausted sigh. Robin smiled.

In mere moments, due to Luffy's vigorous movements, rubble thinly coated the floor of the entire kitchen as well as the deck. There was no pile large enough that the hat could be under it, yet they had yet to find the troublesome item.

"Did he have it on when he came crashing into here?" Usopp asked.

Robin, Zoro and Chopper shrugged. Nami shook her head.

"He came rocketing in before we could even register that he was there, let alone what he was. We couldn't possibly have seen any details," the navigator replied.

And so yet another search was made of every single room on the ship, despite the fact that it was extremely improbable that the hat would be anywhere other then in the kitchen or on the decks. Yet the hat was not found.

"He must have lost it while shooting through the air," Sanji finally concluded.

"We know that, fancy-brow."

"So then we have to head back," Nami cut in. "Sanji-kun, Usopp, get the helm."

"Of course, Nami-san!"

The pirates all rushed to do something useful except for Luffy, who would not move from his special perch on the figurehead, Zoro, who decided to take a nap, and Nami, who preferred to give the orders.

Just as the ship had turned, Luffy let out a shout.

"I found it!"

Chopper and Robin, searching the sea for the hat from the observation deck, Sanji and Usopp, pulling the helm, Zoro, sleeping against the railing on the deck beside the figurehead, and Nami, calculating exactly where it may have fallen on the other side of the figurehead where she was leaning over the railing, all stopped what they were doing to stare at the captain.

He had apparently stretched his arm to reach it, and it was dripping wet. Not appearing to care, Luffy pulled it onto his head with a wide grin of satisfaction.

"Luffy," said Nami in exasperation, "couldn't you have done that before we turned the ship around?"

Luffy stuck out his tongue at her in a contented sort of way, the grin never leaving his face. Nami rolled her eyes and turned around briefly to shout at the two at the helm.

"Okay, Usopp, Sanji-kun! Turn back around!"

"What!" cried Usopp, but a second later was flying at the opposite wall.

"Don't you talk back to a lady!" said a fuming Sanji. Usopp was just fishing in his pockets for a Tabasco Boshi, when the navigator's angry shout had him darting back to the helm.

"You two idiots can fight after the ship is heading the right way again!"

"So, why'd you try to leave me behind?" asked Luffy lightly, as though inquiring about the weather.

Despite his light tone, however, everyone on the ship froze. People close enough to one another—Robin and Chopper, Zoro and Nami, Usopp and Sanji—exchanged nervous and troubled glances. Robin was the one who finally spoke.

"We heard the Red Hairs asking you to join them, and thought that you might not be joining them just because we were holding you back."

Luffy stared at the woman as though she had grown an extra head.

"What would make you think that? You guys don't hold me back from anything," the captain said in a sincere voice with wide eyes. Then, realizing something, he added a comment. "Just food."

"That's because if I let you eat all the food you like, we'd be stranded in the middle of the ocean without any. Remember how it was the time that you ate all the food before we reached Alabasta?" Sanji yelled without releasing the helm.

"Because you hesitated before you shook your head," Robin said in reply to Luffy's question before he could reply to Sanji. Luffy stared blankly at the archaeologist, and his six crewmembers sat in suspense as they waited for him to reply.

"What?"

"You didn't say anything for a moment before you said no, which made it seem like you do want to go," Nami explained impatiently. Luffy looked at her in surprise.

"My mouth was full of meat, I had to swallow it," Luffy said. No one really knew what to say to that. Nami turned to sit on the railing, Usopp and Sanji continued pulling the helm, Zoro closed his eyes, and Chopper and Robin climbed down from the observation deck.

"What did you talk about with Shanks?" Nami finally asked. "You must have had quite a bit to say to each other."

"Not much," replied Luffy. "He made fun of me a bit, then I yelled at him a bit, and then he asked me about some things of the things we did. I'm hungry! Sanji, make some food!"

"We just came from a feast! You could have eaten all you want there without bothering me as soon as we got back!" Sanji growled angrily, releasing the helm as they got back on track.

"But I didn't eat that much! Sanji!"

"Fine, fine…" grumbling and muttering a few inaudible curses under his breath, the cook went to work.

"So, I see that he gave you back the hat," Robin commented.

"Yup," said Luffy with a smile. "He said that the hat was meant to be something that stayed with me until we really faced each other, and this time, we met as friends instead of rivals."

Robin gave a small smile. It seemed slightly out of character for Red Hair Shanks to explain so much, but after all, she didn't know the man all that well.

"Sanji, is the food ready yet?" the captain bellowed.

"In a minute, in a minute," came the grumbled reply from the kitchen.

"I think I'm going to sleep…" Nami mumbled with a yawn, sliding off the railing and beginning to walk away.

"Me too," muttered Usopp, climbing down through the trapdoor, followed closely by Chopper. Zoro remained asleep on the deck, and Robin climbed back up to the observation deck—it was Chopper's turn officially, but they had all been up for almost an entire day and night now. The young reindeer deserved some rest.

Luffy watched his crew with a soft smile on his face that went unseen by them all.

__

"Shanks?" Luffy asked, breaking the silence after he had told the older man about their adventures.

"Hm?" Shanks replied.

"Thanks."

"For what?" Luffy's brow furrowed slightly before he replied.

"Well, there are a lot of things that I should be thanking you for, I guess. For coming to help me even after I'd snapped at you, for saving me, for teaching me that sometimes laughing off insults is better than fighting… But I meant for not letting me join you."

A slow smile appeared on the face of the red haired man, and he reached up to remove his old straw hat.

"You're welcome." As Shanks spoke the words, Luffy felt something soft cover his head. It was so familiar that he did not need to reach up and feel it to know what it was—he had been wearing it everyday for the past ten years, after all.

Author's Note:

Did you catch that about Shanks and the hat? I didn't want to get too specific… If you didn't understand anything, tell me!

Okay, now I can't bribe you to review with any more chapters since there aren't going to be any, but please, review! Tell me what you thought, mistakes you found, things you liked/disliked…

Thanks to all my readers and reviewers for following this story to the end! It feels a bit sad to be leaving it now… Thanks to everyone again!


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